Absinthe
by Aurette
Summary: A dark deed on a dark night sends two lives spinning out of control. To forge a future, both must confront their pasts. AU, EWE, SS/HG, HEA
1. Too Good to be True

**AN** : Hello? Is anyone still out there? Well, to whomever might find this tale, I offer a warning: It's dark. This story has elements of substance abuse, sexual abuse and general angst. However, it also has a happy ending. So for those of you who dislike dark themes, go ahead and click the back button. The rest of you, know that my dark is mostly in your own heads, so it wont get that ghastly. This story is finished, but un-beta'd, no britpick, no spag. So you get what you get, but you get the best I can give. It's a way to pass the time.

 **Not Mine No Money**

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Snape stalked into his office, dropped his papers on his desk, and continued straight through to his rooms. Pulling off his outer robes, he hung them carefully in his wardrobe before pulling out a bottle of Absinthe. He indulged rarely, but when he felt the need, he felt it deep. This drink alone wasn't going to be enough.

He took solace in the ritual of preparation. He poured, and as it bloomed, he took the time to snatch off his cravat and pop open the buttons on his cuffs. He emptied his pockets, scrubbed at his face, and then picked up his glass and headed back into his office. Rummaging in his private potions stores, he picked up a small bottle of concentrated alpha-thujone and a dropper. Back to his desk, he measured carefully and doctored his drink. There was a fine line between intensifying the pleasure of his chosen vice, and making himself temporarily schizophrenic. Sitting back, in his chair with its familiar slight creak, he swirled the drink once before taking a sip.

Perfect.

A perfect appetizer for a perfect weekend.

He listened to the blessed silence and smiled, his mind filling in the missing sounds; the yelling and whinging and pleading of the students, the insipid questions and mundane requests of his fellow staff, the incessant arguing of the harpy…

Gone. All of it gone. At least for the weekend. In actuality, he had one more week to deal with the termagant and then it was officially good bye and good riddance, but he was likely to see little of her during that time and nothing of her for the next two and a half days.

He intended to spend the majority of that time exploring the resiliency of his brain cells and the rest of it examining the insides of his eyelids. He hadn't indulged since the Christmas holiday because he was highly disciplined and methodical about his vices. He commanded them with a firm hand so as to not let them think they could ever command him. _He_ chose the time and place, and, as a potioner, he could even chose the degree and duration.

Since the end of the war three years ago, his chem set, as he liked to call it, was devoted to recreation and not survival. So much the better. He'd developed all sorts of interesting effects and affects, some with more success than others. He avoided the more sinister ingredients—history's gutters were rife with potioners who hadn't—and knew his tolerances, so he was a bit smug about having a bit of fun.

He looked at the stack of papers on his desk and sighed. It would take a while before he was completely skulled, so he could still be a little productive. Setting his glass down, he rolled up his sleeves and picked up the stack of applications. Flicking his wand at the candles in his office, he increased the light and set his feet up on the desk.

Cyrano Tremore, was the first on the stack. His qualifications were good, but Snape simply couldn't get around that first name. He detested being ridiculed and couldn't help but think having an apprentice named Cyrano left the door far too open. He liked to think he was above denying a candidate based on something so petty, so he dropped the C.V. on his desk and mentally labeled that stack Potential. He knew at some point before Monday it would make its way into Denied, but at least he didn't have to face his personal shortcomings quite yet.

Alasande duMonde was bright, intelligent and came with glowing letters from her professors at Beauxbatons. Her application was the first into the Denied pile. There was no way in hell he would ever take on another female apprentice. These two years with Granger had been pure, unadulterated hell. Thank fuck it was over soon.

Sergei Thornseed's application went straight into the rubbish. He didn't need to send him a rejection letter since he'd run into the seedy little blighter down in Hogsmeade and put paid to his ambitions. As if he would get anywhere respectable with bribery. _Like uncle, like nephew_ , he thought. Thornseed had been Dolohov's nephew, and Snape snarled, remembering how the smarmy little gobshite had even gone so far as to hint that he would allow any sexual advances, if that was the sort of arrangement he shared with his current apprentice.

As if.

Snape reached out and took a swallow of his drink. Since he was being moderately honest with himself, he could admit that the idea of bedding the bitch was appealing on more than one level, but it had never happened and never would. If familiarity bred contempt amongst compatriots, then what he and Granger shared was something much darker. He hadn't liked her _before_ they grew familiar. Now they despised each other.

He ground his teeth, remembering her non-stop arguing, questioning and demanding—and that had been while she'd still been intimidated by him. Once she grew comfortable with her place, it had got far worse. Now, at the end of her apprenticeship, she didn't respect him or his opinions at all, blatantly ignored him when he spoke to her, and made a habit of not consulting him on a paper until _after_ she'd finished it. He'd taken to reading the Journals in a state of panic, fearing to see his name attached to something truly misguided. Not that it had ever happened.

He sat back, looking at the desk across the room and imagining somebody new there. The idea was both appealing, and yet, not without anxiety. He hated change.

His memory filled in her form at its finest, sitting at her desk lost in thought. He saw her nervous habit of chewing her lip, biting her quill, and twirling her hair around her finger when she was deep in thought. That was always when she was the most pleasant. There was something different about her in those moments, and he could almost call her agreeable. It was what had kept him from skinning her and pickling the hide for potions ingredients.

He smirked and lifted his glass again.

He'd never had an apprentice before her, and in all honesty, she was worthy of being the first. All things considered, he was sanguine about sending her out in the world to represent his reputation in the potions' community. He'd managed to rein in her worst trait, her stubborn belief that she knew what she was doing before she'd even attempted any practical application of her daft theories, and she'd finally become a fairly nuanced thinker. Of course, any possibility for mutual respect had been destroyed in the process of breaking her of her bad habits.

He sincerely doubted there would be any grateful tokens of esteem when she sat her exams next week. He wondered if he should get her something anyway. Better not. It might turn into an expected tradition, and who knew how many bloody apprentices Minerva was going to force upon him.

He sighed and looked at the next application.

Bertrand Espanola was a good candidate. Solid grades in school, although not as good as the French chit's. He had also done a bit of apprentice-work already, until his master had died suddenly. Snape scanned his C.V. and his letters of recommendation and put him in the Potential pile. He seemed likely, but Snape wanted to look into exactly _how_ his former mentor had died. God help him if it had been an accident in the lab.

Another application landed in the Denied pile. No women—and certainly not one that was part Veela.

He knew there was little chance of getting another harridan like Granger, but Granger's propensity for chewing up his nerve endings actually went far toward alleviating the annoyance of Granger's robes plastered to her sweat-soaked tits. Or the memory of the fawn-like glances she'd once given him when she'd thought he wasn't looking. Granted, it had been a long time since he'd received one of those, and there were a million ways to interpret them. Just because he would occasionally call her to mind in the dark of the night didn't mean anything. He was male, and she was… well, a blind man could see what she was, and he was most certainly not blind. In fact, there was a good chance that if she hadn't been a world-class cunt, he would have ended up a complete letch. Best not take chances. He hadn't been with a woman since he'd recovered, and didn't think it likely any time soon. Not with his monk-like lifestyle.

Gerald Speckle was another solid candidate. His application made it into the Potential pile, despite Snape's reservations about being able to put up with his tendency to spit when he spoke. As long as he kept his mouth shut while he brewed, he might work out. The idea of churning out potions filled with Speckle spit made him shudder, but then struck him as wildly amusing and caused a dark chuckle.

Three more women were shunted to the side, and four more young men went with them. In the end, he had seven Potentials, but no clear winner. He would need to have them in to brew and do a more intensive round of interviews. With a heavy sigh, he put the seven applications to the side and pulled his feet off the desk. He drained his drink and went to pour another one before he started writing his rejection letters.

Hopefully he would get through them before his brain started to melt. He made a mental note to not mail them until he'd thoroughly revised them.

:

He was on his fifth glass and the dark chuckling was flowing. He'd taken the precaution of writing FIRST DRAFT in bright red across all of the Hogwarts letterhead he was using just in case he was daft enough to forget and try to send them. His comments to the women in particular would get him censured by the Ministry Board and blistered by McGonagall for sure. It would seem that his self-addled brain had decided to try out misogyny this weekend.

He was cackling at his own wit when heard the distinctive creak of Granger's door echo through the open classroom. It sounded abnormally loud out in the empty hallway. He tilted his head to the side, confused. She had gone to spend the weekend with her parents before buckling down for the final binge study for her exams. He'd thought himself alone for the weekend, aside from Minerva and Hagrid. The rest of the staff was on holiday now that summer had begun.

He looked down at his childish rejection letters and suddenly felt stupid.

He hated feeling stupid.

He grabbed up the stack and shoved them in the drawer, pulling out clean letterhead and slapping it on the desk.

Blast that woman. She ruined all his fun.

He started in on something vaguely coherent and only slightly peevish for Greta Voorhees, keeping an ear out for his irritating apprentice. He knew he was in trouble when he added one extra o and three extra e's to the woman's surname.

Damn.

Spying his unfinished drink, he snatched it up, quaffed the rest, and cleaned it with a quick flick. Eyeing it with unease, he then tried to charm it to look like an empty ink bottle. The result looked a bit like a glass sculpture of griffin dung, and he had to struggle against the resulting desire to titter like a firstie. He shoved in it another drawer then dimmed the candles for good measure. Granger hated when he kept the lights low so he did it as often as possible.

Soon enough, the door leading from her private chambers to their office opened. He kept his nose to the parchment and ignored her, hoping she would get whatever it was she forgot and fuck off.

"Professor Snape?"

He gritted his teeth. "Hmmm?"

Her voice was a quavering whisper as if she had to force the words out. "I-I just wanted to thank you. I-I can't begin to tell you how much I have enjoyed working with you these last two years."

His head snapped around and seemed to keep going as he turned to her in shock. He had the sensation of endlessly turning to the left. He narrowed his eyes at her, wondering what sort of joke she was playing at, and if it was actually possible his head was still turning left. _Could she see it? What did it look like? Wait._ _What?_

"Excuse me?" His eyes finally focused on her and then sprang wide. "Miss Granger, what the _hell_ are you wearing?"

The answer was not much. She stood before him in a silk nightie that barely covered her pert little arse. It was a light-emerald color, with white lace edging. Absinthe colored. _Oh, the green fairy!_ _Come here and let me drink you…_

As if she heard his thought, she folded her hands together and walked closer with the mincing glide of a geisha. "I've loved working with you these past two years," she said. Her words were strangely mechanical-sounding to his ears, but then that wasn't unusual at this point in his indulgence. "I know our time is almost at an end, and there won't be time after this weekend to properly express my… appreciation."

Hang on a minute… This is was it? _Blast, did I mix a bad batch? Am I sitting here staring at the empty walls again? It used to be Lily… Even Granger makes for a nice change._

He swallowed and blinked several times, but she was still walking towards him half naked and, from the state of her breasts, slightly chilled. "Miss Granger, I repeat, what do you think you are doing walking in here dressed like that?"

She didn't answer. Instead, she reached out and stroked her hand through his hair.

He froze. His hallucinations had never included tactile sensation before.

"I love your hair. I always have," she said in a dreamy voice.

 _Oh, shit._

Realizing he was eye-level with her breasts, he sprang out of his chair and backed away, alarms clanging in his brain. "Granger, are you feeling alright? Have you been drinking? Or… anything _else?_ "

"I haven't had a drop. I'm perfectly fine," she said, walking around his chair and backing him up against the wall. She reached up and stroked his face. "And I love your nose."

"You _do?_ "

"It's your best quality, you know. Without it, your face wouldn't be nearly as handsome."

"Are you _quite_ sure you're alright?" He was utterly flummoxed. Nothing in her demeanor or behavior these last six months would have led him to believe it even remotely possible that she harbored such opinions. In fact, she'd been so immersed in her studies that he hadn't thought she'd had time for such fancies about anyone at all, never mind him. Aside from those doe-eyed looks when she'd first started, he could only recall one incident that might vaguely have passed as complimentary towards him. He'd overheard her telling the Weasley girl that she rather liked his voice when he wasn't using it to be an utter bastard, which was seldom.

"I already told you, silly, I'm fine. Better than fine, in fact." She grabbed his hand—he only put up a reflexive resistance—and guided it to her waist. "See?"

His mind went blank and he felt the world shift sideways as she guided his hand up to cup her breast. His fingers left vapor trails on the silk. _Oh, holy hell_. He'd definitely picked the wrong night to try for better living through chemistry. The small kernel of attraction he'd mostly ignored for the last year, exploded into something far bigger. Was it the drink? His loneliness? Or had he really thought more of her than he'd wanted to admit under such adversarial conditions?

 _All of the above_ , his conscience whispered.

He shook his head to clear it and pulled his hand away, but not before curling his fingers and testing the heft of her lovely breast. "Miss Granger, I'm flattered—more than flattered, I'm… flabbergasted, actually—but perhaps we would be better off having this conversation _after_ your exams. I know you think I'm a bit of a shit, but in fact, I _am_ mindful of the potential for harm to your reputation if we were to… take this any further tonight."

There. The high road. He'd seized it. Or did one seize the high ground? Whichever, he'd done his duty. If she put his hand on her tit again, he would seize the day...

She frowned. "I don't like your nobility. I always thought that was one of your weaker characteristics."

A surge of anger washed through him, and he shoved her back. "I _beg_ your pardon?" There had been long, lonely years where Snape had nothing but his sense of honor to sustain him.

"There! That. I love that," she said with a small smile, banishing his indignation with a single word. "Your prickly pride." She swayed forward and pressed herself against him, all silk-clad curves and tumbling hair. "I like a proud man," she said in a husky voice. "I love the way you snap and snark."

"You _do_?" he repeated like a berk. Why did she keep saying 'love'? That word held such potential for self-mutilation for him. Couldn't she just like his snap and snark a lot?

Her hands traveled up his sides before gliding across his narrow chest. He felt instantly self-conscious, knowing his chest wasn't one of his better qualities. He was in better than average shape for his age, he knew that, but a better than average stick figure was still a stick figure.

"I do," she said, leaning in closer. "In fact, I love many things about you."

 _Oh, gods. There's that word again. This won't end well_.

She scraped her nails down his chest and kept going. He honestly couldn't tell if he was elated and aroused or flat-out terrified. The last woman who'd come on to him this strongly was Bellatrix, and that was _not_ a night to be dwelled on.

"Miss Granger, I really think we should— _oh, my goodness_!"

Colors exploded behind his eyes as she grabbed hold of his bits. He vaguely realized that hadn't been one of the more masculine tones in his repertoire, but as her hand stroked him through his trousers, he stopped giving a fuck.

"I want you to touch me. I want that more than anything in the world," she said with a throaty rumble.

"Not… good," was about the last bit of honor he could scrape together.

She growled in frustration, a sound that brought him to full stand, and grabbed his hands. Pulling them around behind her, she placed them on her arse. Oh, gods above, she wasn't wearing knickers.

Snape groaned and ran his hands over the firm curves of her bum. "You want this?" he asked. _Begged?_ "You really want me?"

"Yes! Yes! I want you to kiss me. Please. I crave your kisses, and I need your touch." She leaned up and planted a soft kiss on the corner of his mouth. Her breath smelled like cherries. "Will you take me to bed?" she asked in a plaintive whisper.

The alarms were now shrieking at him, but he ignored them all. True, this was an incredibly stupid idea, but it hadn't been his idea. Her apprenticeship was over in all but the fine print. He'd taught her everything he knew. She stroked his cock through the fabric again, eliciting a cascade of drug-enhanced sensations. _Oh, Circe's teat_. He'd always heard absinthe enhanced sex, but hadn't ever had the good fortune to try it before.

He licked his lips, stroking the silken skin of her arse. "Whatever you desire," he replied, pulling her against him and kissing her for all he was worth.

Curiously, despite the nearly over-whelming sensory input of holding a writhing Granger in his arms, his thoughts grew remarkably lucid. If this was some sort of thank you shag—pity shag?—then he'd have to make a good showing to ensure she'd want a repeat performance. _Bed. Get her to a bed. Do this right, fool!_ He scooped her up, away from the more convenient desk, and stumbled to his rooms. She urged him on—"Hurry! I need you now!"—and he nearly killed himself in the dark once he gained his bedroom. He winced at the realization that his bed was unmade and his sheets overdue for a change, and then growled at how stupid this thought was. He never made his bed. What was the point? He was only going to crawl back in at some point, and no one ever saw it. Now it struck him as the proverbial trip to the hospital in dirty knickers. He left the candles out. There was enough light coming through the door, once his eyes adjusted.

Once he reached the bed, she twisted in his arms like a cat. He nearly dropped her on her face— _Bad! That was bad!_ —but she bounced up and snatched off her scrap of garment. When she reached for him, her strength surprised him and he tumbled down on top of her, managing to break his fall without injuring her. _Good. This is good!_ When she grabbed his face and kissed him, he was pretty sure he might have started giggling. Not an unexpected side effect to his indulgence, just several hours early.

Christ, she was beautiful. Even in the gloomy dark, her body was perfection. Her hair tumbled down past her shoulders and just barely hid her dusky nipples. It was the most erotic thing he'd ever seen. He wanted to take his time, but she was having none of it. Her constant demands and commands and her sexy little whine when he took too long getting his boots, socks and trousers off, enflamed him. He laughed, really laughed, thinking that he would normally be irritated by her inability to shut the fuck up. Now? He never wanted her to stop talking. Not when it was a litany of how much she liked—no, _loved_ —his various assets.

Stretched out on top of her naked, he needed a minute just to digest the sensual intensity of so much skin. His drug-addled brain was constantly misfiring and the resulting synesthesia was nearly overwhelming. Feeling her body against his like this was almost ecstasy enough.

"You're perfect," he blurted, between kisses on her neck. "So lovely…" His hand wrapped around her breast and plucked her nipple gently, eliciting a gasp. "Tell me what you like," he crooned. "What do you want, Hermione?" He'd never said her name like that before, and it struck him that her name was as beautiful as she was so he said it again, several times.

She stroked her hands down his back and cupped his arse, pulling him tighter against her as she wrapped her legs around him. He felt the heat of her core and hissed.

"Just fuck me, Snape."

He chuckled. So eager! He denied her request and slid down her body. Her pleasure first, then his. It was only good manners.

It took some nudging and pushing but eventually he got them into the best position. She seemed reluctant to climb on top of him, which only made him more determined. He knew he was good at this. He kneaded her hips and arse with soothing strokes as he feasted on her core; she tasted like heaven. He looked up at her hovering above him, watching, learning what she liked by the movements of her brows. That passion so often looked like pain wasn't a new thought, but in her case, it occasionally looked disturbingly like disgust. _Must be the drugs_.

He applied himself with renewed diligence.

When her hands slid into his hair and clutched at his scalp, he moaned. There. That's what he was looking for. He built up that fire until she was grinding down onto him, and when she came apart with a quivering cry, he nearly spent himself from the thrill.

He rolled her off and crawled up her body, taking a moment to wipe his face on the sheets. She looked dazed. Surely that hadn't been the first time someone did that for her… _Had it?_

"Did you like that?" he asked quietly, kissing her neck. "Are you ready for more?"

She shuddered from head to toe and replied in a flat voice, like an order, "I want you to fuck me."

He could only respond with a wobbly nod as he wrapped her legs around him. With a deep moan, he slipped inside and felt his heart stop. The combination of sex and his enhanced drink was too much. She blurred before him, and he realized his eyes were swimming with tears again. She clutched at him, pulling and pushing, and resuming her constant litany of how much she loved his body, his cock, and yes, even his greasy hair and accursed nose. With a slow, painful thud, his heart started again and he felt a rare, blissful smile steal across his face. Alcohol and chemicals took command of his emotions, and he let himself slip free of his own restraints.

Everything came clear to him in that moment. He adored her. Not just her incredible body, or her unleashed libido, but her brilliant mind, her fierce temper, and her incredible loyalty. Even at their worst, and these last months had undoubtedly been the worst, she still wouldn't tolerate even the slightest ill comment about him from one of the students. He sighed, sliding himself in and out of her incredible warmth. It was so obvious now. His resistance in choosing another female apprentice was due to his reluctance to prove this one was easily replaced.

His breath hitched and his chest tightened. "Hermione," he groaned. "You're so magnificent—"

His clarity dribbled away and he lost himself in pure sensation. She was so hot and wet and eager—not to mention flexible. He turned her this way and that, always seeking an angle that would make her fly apart again. He was desperate to give her every pleasure he was capable of. She moaned and writhed, her comments growing more sparse, until she was almost worrying with how silent she'd become. If it wasn't for the way her body responded, he wouldn't have been sure of himself. But she _did_ respond. Her body was gloriously responsive. When he felt her clench around him, pulsing and shuddering another release as her breath hissed out, he felt as if this was his greatest achievement in life.

He rolled with her again, ending up on top of her so he could see the play of light and shadow across her face. He leaned down and kissed her gently, his tongue tangling with hers in languid ecstasy. She stroked her hand down his cheek, but other than that gesture, she seemed utterly boneless beneath him. He deepened the kiss as he drove himself deeper, faster, working toward his own release. They had been more frenzied than prudent, and he worried she might be getting sore. As the end crept inevitably closer, he began to let free with a drug-induced babble he'd never have been capable of sober.

"Oh, Hermione. You're so incredible. I never thought this would happen, but I'm so glad it did. Tell me again. Tell me how much you want me."

"I do," she practically shouted. "I love this! I love when you touch me. I love you fucking me. I love _you_. I love you so much!"

His eyes flew open and he stared down at her in shock that quickly mutated into a profound elation. " _Bloody hell!_ You _do?_ "

"Yes! _Yes!_ " she screamed.

His heart felt like it was going to burst. "Hermione… My sweet little Hermione, oh lord. I didn't know. I had no idea." He rose up over her, staring down at her in wonder as his heart cracked wide open. "I could love you. Of course I could! What's not to love? You're brilliant… you always were. I'm so sorry for the way I've treated you. I just wanted you to be the best. Oh, and you are. My gods, you're head and shoulders above the rest of those halfwit researchers in the field..."

It finally occurred to him that this was probably not the most romantic line of commentary to pursue while shagging a beautiful woman, so he set about listing off everything about her that he found superlative. He probably overwhelmed her with his admissions. Definitely, by her look of confusion, but these realizations were so newly hatched as to still be wet, confusing him as well.

He closed his eyes, replaying the memory of her telling him she loved him over and over as he shoved himself into her being. She didn't repeat it, but then she might not have intended to blurt it out to begin with. Sucking in great lungfuls of air, he tried to _show_ her how much he could cherish her. He did his damnedest to let her know he would treasure her. She mewled and squirmed under him as he trembled in her clutching arms.

His climax rushed up at him, making his babbled words even more incoherent. When he came, colors exploded around the room as his mind slipped its leash at last and the world faded to black.

When he opened his eyes again, he was crushing her flat to the bed. He couldn't have been out long. Surely she would have shoved him off when he started to suffocate her. He only weighed ten stone, but she couldn't be much more than half that soaking wet. He carefully lifted himself off of her and pulled her tight against him, trying to drag a blanket over them while kissing her all over her cheek, jaw, and neck. He was babbling again, trying to find a way to describe what he'd never had to articulate before. He had no idea what he was saying, but by the gods, he meant every word.

She put her hand up and covered his mouth, surprising him, and he kissed her fingertips and fell silent, smiling at her.

"Stop talking," she said. "I've always found your voice irritating when you weren't yelling."

He went still, utterly confused and flailing to pull his thoughts together. "But—" His body grew cold and numb, the flow of ice curiously reminiscent of Nagini's venom coursing through his veins. "You once said—"

He stopped again.

She'd said she'd _liked_ his voice in the past when he wasn't yelling.

Feeling increasingly ill at ease, he leaned up on one elbow and looked down at her. Again, the sporadic episodes of intuitive clarity that only came with his particular cocktail crystallized his mind and dark suspicion seeped in. He pushed away from her and fished around on the floor for his wand.

" _Lumos Maxima!_ " he hissed. Wandlight flared to life with a blinding vengeance. He squinted and shielded his eyes from the glare.

She did not.

His body shuddered, registering what that signified even as his mind started to retreat from the same fact. Forcing his eyes open, he looked into hers. A low moan escaped him as she stared back at him. One eye was blown wide, barely any of her warm, brown iris showed at all. The other pupil was a pinprick. His mind finally snapped into perfect understanding and his heart seemed to stop with one last, painful bang of a beat.

 _Cursed_.

She'd been cursed. She'd come to him under the influence of a curse, and he'd just—

"Oh, Christ… " he rasped, pushing himself away. The horror washed over him like a wave of burning acid. "Oh, _fuck!_ "

He threw himself out of the bed and scrambled into his bathroom, making it just in time to empty his stomach into the toilet.

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Review replies will be sacrificed for expediency. I need to get all seven chapters up before I leave town on Monday.


	2. To True to be Good

**AN:** Okay, so, wow, yeah, people are still here! Boy are they! So good to see old friends again. Thank **Musicalkilljoy** for prodding me on the right day with the moon in the right phase while my hormones were in the right condition for the fact that I managed to finally bang out an ending on a story I started four years ago. Or, conversely, blame her if you hate it. *gigglesnort*

* * *

Snape rinsed his mouth out with repetitive mechanical motions as his mind howled.

Cursed! How the fuck had he possibly missed it? After the last two years of hell, did he _really_ think Granger would have just wandered into his office to seduce him out of _gratitude?_

He planted his hands on either side of the basin and looked up into the mirror. ' _I love your hair,_ ' he heard again. He stared at his lank, greasy hair and cringed. He was so fucking stupid. _'…and I love your nose.'_

A cry escaped as a fresh wave of horror washed over him, echoing through his brain along with Bellatrix's maniacal cackle. _'Fool! Who would actually want to be with you? I only slept with you under our lord's command! He's the one that gave you a pity shag. I was just the body. Personally, I'd rather have fucked Pettigrew.'_

He stared at his ugly face; saw the pathetic tears tracking down his cheeks. With an anguished cry, he picked up the soap dish and smashed it into the mirror. Still holding it, he spun around and hurled the plastic dish across the bathroom where it cracked a tile in the shower. " _NOOOO!_ " he bellowed, folding in the middle and sinking to the floor.

Gods, he'd _raped_ her. It was rape, pure and simple. She might have blown up on him like a frigate in full sail, but under a curse, there _was_ no willing consent. He should have known. For fuck's sake, he'd taught _Defense_. What kind of imbecile doesn't question that sort of behavior change? What the hell was he supposed to tell the Wizengamot? _'I'm sorry, your honor, I was drunk and tripping at the time the victim arrived. I didn't notice anything was wrong until she told me to shut the fuck up.'_ And what the hell _had_ he been saying? _Gods!_ What a fool he'd made of himself! There's no telling _what_ he'd been babbling in his coital bliss.

He couldn't think. Couldn't function. He couldn't get past the fact that he'd raped his apprentice. Hermione _bloody_ Granger! The fucking darling of the Wizarding World!

One week. He'd had one fucking week to be free of her forever and now this.

He sucked in air and let it out in a shuddering breath. Enough self-pity. The woman was still in his bed, suffering. Pushing himself up off the floor, he squared his shoulders and left the bathroom. He lit a candle across the room with a flick and kept to the shadows as he pulled fresh clothes out of his wardrobe. Granger was wrapped in the blanket asleep, or seeming to be from where he stood. Her face was pinched, her usual expression when dealing with stress.

He dressed quickly, practiced hands making short work of the buttons.

Buttons.

There would never be enough buttons to keep him from being repeatedly exposed.

He turned and walked back out to his office and through into Granger's rooms. After a quick glance around, he snatched open drawers, settling on a pair of baggy jeans, thick socks, utilitarian pants and an oversized jumper. It was all overly warm for the season, but he thought she might appreciate covering as much skin as possible.

He stormed back into his potion stores and snatched up four bottles. He drank one immediately to start counteracting the poisons he'd filled himself with. The other three were for her. One was a contraceptive, good for 24 hours before and after, another was good for helping to alleviate curse symptoms—he knew from personal experience—and the last was a mild sedative. Who knew how hysterical she would be when he freed her from the curse?

Based on the last glance he'd seen before the mirror had shattered, it was a safe bet the answer would be, _very_.

Back in his rooms, he approached the bed as if he were walking to his execution. In a way, he was. He pulled out his wand and with a practiced flick, intoned, " _Finite Incantatum_."

He sighed and reached down to lift an eyelid. She opened her eyes before he even touched her, and he could see it had failed. "More already?" she said in a husky voice. "I can't wait." She pushed the blanket off, but he tugged it back up. "Stop," she whined. "I want you to see me naked."

He shook his head. Granger had never whined in all the years he'd known her, and he was fairly certain she did _not_ want him to see her naked.

He handed her the first potion. "Drink."

She did so without any hesitation.

Taking the vial back, he dumped the clothes in her lap. "Get dressed," he said, before stepping back.

She looked at him, bewildered. "Why on earth would I want to get dressed? I thought you were going to shag me again."

He ground his teeth together, amazed anew by his utter stupidity. How could he have been fooled by this? "It will be a cold day in hell before I ever shag you again, woman. Get up and get dressed _now_."

She threw the clothes to the floor and spread her arms, thrusting her breasts out at him. "I don't want to. I want you took look at me. I like when you look at me naked."

She started to run her hands across her chest, and he snarled and Stupefied her. Tugging the blanket back over her, he stepped back and went through every spell he knew that would counter a simple curse. Each time, he checked her eyes and bit out a snarl. He knew they wouldn't work. The mismatched pupils were a sign of Dark magic and nothing so easy to reverse as an Imperio.

Once he'd run through his repertoire, he arranged her into a more comfortable position, turned on his heel, and left.

:

It was four in the morning when he began to narrow it down to a particular family of curses. There were so many pertaining to altering one's behavior or playing with one's emotions that it had taken forever to even come close. His list of symptoms was too vague.

He looked up, as the clock chimed, and rubbed at his eyes. They were puffy and felt like they'd been lacerated by sand.

He sat back and stretched his neck. Between the alcohol, the additive, and… exertion, he was beyond exhausted, but he had Granger down in his bed under Merlin only knows what curse, and he'd been afraid to find out too late that time had been an element. With the family of curses he'd narrowed it down to, it wasn't. Thank the gods for that. He sighed and closed his eyes for only a moment and didn't even realize he'd fallen asleep.

He jerked awake when a hand touched his shoulder. Mentally scrabbling away from a nightmare in which he was forced to whip the skin off Granger's back before the examination committee, it took him a moment to orient himself.

"Severus? Are you alright?"

He looked up into Minerva's concerned face and shuddered. _No,_ he thought. _I'll never be alright again_. He blinked and looked around. There was a suspicious amount of sunshine.

"What time is it?" he rasped.

"Almost noon," she replied. "Have you been here all night? Why are you researching curses?"

In a flash, his mind cleared. He jerked to a stand. "I'm sorry. I've been lost in some research." He snatched up the books he'd been reading and the ones he hadn't gotten to yet. "I don't mean to be rude, but I must check on something."

With a slight bow, he pushed past her with his arms full of books.

"Severus," she called, stopping him in his tracks. "Is there something I should know?"

He grimaced and nodded his head. "But not yet. I'm not sure disclosure is my choice to make."

She held his gaze and then nodded in return. "Eat, son. You look terrible."

He scrunched up his face and fled.

Back in his rooms he found what he'd feared. He'd left her unconscious long enough for her to have pissed the bed. Could he do _nothing_ right? He set the books down and tried to think through what would be worse, to wake up in a soiled bed? Or to have the man that violated you give you a bath? He couldn't decide. He didn't think he knew her well enough anymore to be sure. Scooping his arms under her, he carried her to his bathroom.

He scrubbed her until she was pink, irrationally hoping he could scrub himself off of her somehow and make it even slightly less horrendous than it was. He left her in the empty tub and hurried back to clean up his bed and change the sheets. Dressing her was difficult, but he got the job done and laid her down on his bed.

When he hit her with an Ennervate, there was food and tea already set on a small table next to the bed. She looked around, confused, and sat up. When she saw the clothes she was wearing and the food waiting for her, she grimaced in distaste. "Look at you," she said with a sneer. "The noble one. It sickens me that you can be so _sweet_."

"Shut up and eat," he snarled.

She seemed to shudder delicately. "I love when you talk like that."

He turned away and snatched up a text, listening to the sound of her picking up her tea cup.

Tilting his head to the side, he contemplated her words. He went back over everything she'd said since she'd wandered into the office last night, looking for clues. Finally, the one that had tipped him off replayed itself. ' _I've always found your voice irritating when you weren't yelling._ '

He narrowed his eyes and attacked the appendixes with renewed intent. An hour later he had it narrowed down to one of two. He marked the appropriate pages in the texts, made sure Granger couldn't escape the magical restraints he'd conjured to keep her from stripping her clothes off again, and went to get one more item from his stores.

Dragging a chair across the room, he sat down across from her and grabbed her by the jaw. Tipping three drops into her mouth, he capped the vial and waited. There would be no change in her eyes; he was looking for other signs that the potion had taken hold.

When he saw he shoulders relax slightly, he asked, "What do you feel about what we did last night?" Best to go with the answer he was the surest of.

Her face filled with a look akin to avarice. "I loved it. I want to do it again. You can even have me with these ropes on if you'd like."

He sighed and slumped back. Well, that went better than expected. Of the two possible curses, only one of them was resistant to Veritaserum.

He stood up and went back to the books.

 _ **Amore Inversus**_ _-_ _First heard of in the fourteenth century, it was a popular curse used most often to disgrace and ruin political enemies in Milan, Italy_ …

He finished reading and stared at the page, shocked that he was capable of being even more hurt than he already was. He wanted it to be wrong, to be a different curse, _any_ other curse, just to soothe his mangled soul. But none of the others fit the known symptoms. Sexual compulsion, duration, strength, mismatched optic dilation, resistance to standard remedies, and an _inversion of emotion_.

It was that last that hurt. He'd hoped at least for an exaggeration. Down where he never paid attention, he'd been praying that at least some of it had been real.

Of course none of it was.

' _I love your hair_.' His hair repulsed her.

'… _your nose…without it, your face wouldn't be nearly as handsome_.' He was grotesque.

' _I've loved working with you these past two years…_ ' How could he have been that delusional? They'd _hated_ each other for two years.

' _I love you!_ ' He closed his eyes against how much that one hurt. Gods, she _detested_ him.

Her desperation for his touch had been fueled by her actual revulsion. Her constant urging had been twisted pleas for him to stop.

He grimaced around the pain when he realized she really _did_ like his voice. Small recompense.

She must be aware. It only made sense. To get the maximum satisfaction from the curse, it only followed that the victim would have to be aware of it happening and unable to do a damned thing. She was a clever woman. Surely her comment about his voice had been an attempt to tell him something was wrong.

Who would do this to her? Was this aftermath from the war? Some old revenge? Did anyone really hate her that much? Unless _he_ was the intended victim… and Granger was just a pawn?

This thought filled him with a violent rage. He clenched his jaw against his anger. Now was not the time. There were things that needed to be seen to before he could go looking for revenge.

He uncurled himself from the chair and stood up.

"Granger, I believe you're fully cognizant of what is happening to you and unable to convey that fact. If this is the case, then it should set your mind at ease to know I have identified the curse and a remedy is coming forthwith. I need only prepare."

She looked at him with growing anger. "You sicken me with your pathetic attempts to help. I'm not so sure I love you anymore. In fact, I'm beginning to find you rather disgusting."

"Thank you. I'm glad I've finally done something right in this whole fiasco." He untied her. "Feel free to use the facilities if necessary. I will return shortly." He headed out into the office, locking and warding the door behind him. She could walk around, but she couldn't escape. If she pulled her clothes off again, hopefully he would only have to deal with her nudity for a few moments before she was free of the curse.

He headed off towards the Defense classroom.

:

He carefully crushed the moonstone to powder, added the hyssop and firebird gall, and then three drops of wintergreen oil. He sat back and pondered. The last two ingredients were the blood of the focus, his, and something that had power over him to balance the humors. He had no idea what to put in as the last ingredient. What had power over him? The Ministry, certainly, and Minerva as well, else he'd never have taken on an apprentice to begin with. He couldn't think of anything to represent what an easy mark he turned into after a kind word.

He shook his head.

It wasn't just words that had seduced him, nor her pretty face. He pushed away from his workbench and headed into the potions stores, pulling out the bottle of alpha-thujone. In itself, it had no power over him, but he allowed it to whenever he felt like it. In hindsight, that had been a terrible weakness.

He added a quarter-drop to the mixture before slicing into the meat of his thumb and bleeding into the mortar. He sealed the cut with a spell before he mixed it all together and filled the bladder of a trout with it. Taking the small ball in hand, he headed back to his rooms, mentally rehearsing the incantation.

She was sitting on the bed when he entered, naked as predicted. He ignored that. Her charms were lost on him now.

"Open your mouth and lift up your tongue." She started to protest, but he simply grabbed her jaw and shoved the fish bladder into her mouth.

"Under your tongue, or die. Your choice." It was a clumsy bluff, but he needed to punch through the filter of the curse to secure her cooperation, and self-preservation usually accomplished that.

He held her face in a tight grip as he intoned the counter-curse, watching her eyes the whole time. The left one expanded as the right contracted and then they filled with misery and slid closed. He released her as she shuddered and let out a hiccoughing little sob. "Go ahead and spit it out," he said softly, holding his hand under her mouth. She did, and then grabbed at the blanket and covered herself as best she could. She turned her face away from him with obvious revulsion. "Get dressed," he said in the same tone. "I have some things you can take that will help." He backed off. "I'll be in the office." He turned away, feeling his heart break under the weight of his shame.

He'd cleaned up his bench and had put away his instruments by the time she came out of his rooms. He looked up and wished he hadn't. Her face was swollen and blotchy from her tears, but held an empty, half-dead expression. It was the face of victims throughout history.

"Your wand is in your rooms," he said.

She just nodded, avoiding his face. "I remember leaving it there."

He gestured to two vials. "These will help."

There was a long pause. "Will anything really help?"

He grimaced and lifted a hand as if to reach for her, but dropped it again. What good would that do? "Granger," he said in a broken voice. "I cannot express my regret and sorrow."

She shook her head slowly. "How could you not have _known?_ " she whispered, damning him.

He lifted his empty hands to show he had nothing to offer. "I don't know. I was very drunk when you arrived. That's the only explanation I can offer." _That and the fact that I wanted to believe,_ he added to himself. "If you choose to press charges, I won't put up a defense."

She shook her head. "I suppose you were as much of a victim then, weren't you?"

He swallowed. "That's for you to decide. 'I was pissed' doesn't usually diminish guilt."

She nodded and stared at her feet. "Do you know who would do this?" she asked.

"Not with any certainty, no. I've made a lot of enemies over the years. Where were you when you were cursed?"

"Hogsmeade. I'd left a package at the Three Broomsticks by mistake yesterday. I went back to pick it up after dinner with my parents."

He filed that away for use later. "You will be exhausted for a few days. You should take one tablespoon of each of those every eight hours for the next three days." He gestured toward the door leading to her rooms. "Go sleep. I'll have the elves bring you dinner. Nothing will disturb you."

She shook her head again, clutching the bottles to her. "I want to go back to my parents. I… I need to not… be here."

He winced, struck to the core by her unspoken words. _I can't stand to be near you._ He nodded, rose from his desk, and headed into his rooms without another word, silently closing the door after him. He heard her leave as he leaned against the door hugging his pain to his chest. When he turned and saw the scrap of light green silk pooled on the floor by his bed, he incinerated it in a sudden, white-hot fury, then collapsed down on himself and pressed his forehead to the floor as he cried.

* * *

Three days later he received a notice from the Ministry Board that his apprentice had postponed her Licensing Examination indefinitely for medical reasons. He crushed the letter in his fist, his rage out of proportion to the event, and kicked in the door to her rooms. She'd yet to return from her parents' home, and he expected to find her books and papers neatly stacked on the table like usual. Instead, the room was empty. Stunned, he let the crumpled parchment drop from his hand. Only the furniture remained. She'd cleaned the place out when she'd left that night, and he hadn't even known.

Crushed by a fresh wave of burning guilt and utter rejection, he fled.

* * *

The wards at Grimmauld place were tripped in the middle of the night. Harry and Ron scrambled down the stairs to the door, wands gripped tight in their fists. Ron dropped back when Hermione appeared at the top of the stairs. She'd hardly left the room she'd secluded herself in last week. Seeing her hovering at the top of the stair, he placed himself between her and potential danger as Harry unlocked the door and spelled it open.

There was a shape on the doorstep.

Approaching it carefully, they found a man they didn't recognize. They might not have known him had he been an acquaintance of theirs. His face was a misshapen lump of abused flesh. He was badly beaten and had been dumped there like so much refuse. A quick diagnostic showed several broken bones but nothing life threatening. Harry levitated him into the house and gently rolled him over onto his back. Ron let out a hiss of shock. Whoever he was, his wand had been broken and the pieces had been hammered into the backs of his hands.

A crushed roll of parchment was pinned to his robes.

Harry unrolled it silently, scanning the contents before passing it around. It was written in the precise style of a dict-o-quill, and detailed the confession of one Sergei Thornseed. It included his torturer's questions and even Thornseed's screams of anguish. It seemed the man had taken exception to not being chosen as Snape's next apprentice and taken his revenge on both Snape and his out-going apprentice.

Appended at the end were the words, ' _You know where to find me_ ,' written in a distinctive, spiky script.

Ron and Harry looked back at Hermione. She smiled—a feral, terrifying smile—before dropping the parchment on the man's chest. She turned and walked back up the stairs and shut herself in her room as Harry and Ron exchanged worried glances. With a heavy sigh, Harry sent off his Patronus to Kingsley Shacklebolt.

* * *

Thornseed was sentenced to twenty years in Azkaban. Snape was only charged with the assault on Thornseed, and was let off with a heavy fine, due to mitigating circumstances. The particulars of the case were kept out of the papers for the most part. Only the facts that she'd been cursed and he'd sought retribution had been reported, not the nature of the incident.

No one was chosen to be the next Potion's Apprentice. After testifying at the trial and paying his fine, Severus Snape resigned from Hogwarts and disappeared.

* * *

Tol' ya it was dark...


	3. Mourning has Broken

**AN:** Last one for the night. The rest tomorrow. Love you all!

* * *

Hermione fidgeted, twisting the tissue in her hands into a rope. She hadn't actually needed a tissue in months, but it was part of the routine. She walked in, sat down—always on the same comfortable chair—snatched a tissue out of the dispenser, and began twisting.

"Did you get your results back yet?" the warm, melodic voice asked.

She nodded. "I passed. Full honors."

"Congratulations. That was quite a hurdle, and you sailed over it."

Hermione looked up, searching for irony and finding none. "Six months late is sailing over it?"

Dr. Peeples nodded. "After what you went through, absolutely." She tilted her head to the side. "How do you feel about it?"

Hermione shrugged, another ritual.

"Proud?" the woman prodded. "Ashamed? Defiant?" There was a pause. "Angry?"

Like a lanced boil that never heals, it all came rushing out again. "Of course I'm angry! I should have taken it six months ago! I could have been working in the lab at St. Mungos for months now, buried in research. Instead, I've spent all this time in Harry's house buried in—" She flailed for a word. "Mud! Muck! I've been buried up to my neck in _filth!_ "

She sagged back in the chair, feeling like a popped balloon, limp and useless.

The woman across from her smiled like a proud mother. "And yet you managed to crawl out of it and do something. You took charge of your life. You took command of your grief and pain instead of continuing to wallow. This is a huge step, Hermione. You need to see that. You're starting to push forward, and not even in baby steps."

Hermione slumped back in the chair. "If this is such a huge leap forward, why don't I feel better? Why won't the nightmares end? Why do I feel so bloody—"

There was a long pause again. "Can you say it?"

It took an enormous inner struggle, but Hermione finally forced it out. "Guilty." She shuddered and closed her eyes, feeling the resentment churning in her gut. "It's so stupid," she muttered, avoiding the other woman's gaze.

Dr. Yolanda Peeples was a squib who had made quite a reputation for herself in the field of Muggle Psychology. Hermione had been given her name by Minerva, after the Headmistress had arrived at Grimmauld in a state. Apparently, Snape had finally explained what had happened, and asked her to check on Hermione after he'd not heard from his apprentice in days. It had taken a month for her to work up the courage to make an appointment but she hadn't missed a week since. The woman had become her rock.

"Hermione, you know you won't be able to push past it without getting it out into the open. Can you tell me why you're struggling with this? It's a perfectly normal reaction, given the circumstances."

"Why?" Hermione clenched her hands into fists around the tissue and set her jaw mulishly. "Why should I feel guilty?"

"You tell me."

"I was a victim! _I_ was the one that was cursed just to get back at _him!_ "

"That's very true."

"I didn't do anything to deserve it! He's the arsehole that makes enemies every time he sneezes!"

"No one deserves to have their free will removed and be forced into that kind of act."

"Exactly! He _had_ free will! No one forced him! How could he be so fucking stupid to think I would _want_ him?" Her chest tightened, and she found it difficult to breathe. "Why would he think—" She struggled for air. " _Why didn't he_ _know?_ " she screamed.

"Do you think he did?"

"No." She slashed her hand through the air to kill that thought. "No way."

"Why do you think he didn't know? You've described your working relationship with him up to that night as mutually abusive. Why do you think he would have thought you were sincere?"

"He said he'd been drinking," she snapped then jutted her chin up. "Does that absolve him?"

"No."

"There! You see? It _was_ his fucking fault!"

"Then why do you feel so guilty?"

Hermione pressed her hand hard against her sternum, trying to push the answer back down. It wouldn't stay, flying out against her will. "Because he was so fucking _happy!_ Gods! You should have _seen_ him! He was so—" Images started to crowd her brain. "Oh, gods," she whispered. "It was so awful."

"Tell me what you feel. Say it, if you can."

Hermione looked up through the tears blurring her vision. "He really believed I _loved_ him. The entire time we were in bed he was trying to show me how… grateful he was. How _touched_. Christ, _he made love to me!_ There were even moments when I actually _enjoyed_ it! And the things he said…" She burst into tears. "He told me he could love me. He told me I was special, _brilliant_. I was a _gift!_ He apologized for the way he'd always treated me and told me all the things I'd needed to hear all along. Personal things I would have died to hear when I first started! He said—" She broke down again and struggled to keep talking. "He said he'd waited his entire life for someone to love him back." She grabbed up three more tissues and scrubbed them against her eyes. When she spoke again, her words were a droning monotone. "He told me he'd never been given a gift before and felt like years' worth of missed birthday presents had landed in his lap in one beautiful package. He called me perfect…" She twisted her head back and forth, trying to dodge the memories. "He said I was better than _her_ because I had the ability to forgive his flaws. It didn't take a genius to know who he was comparing me to."

Silence reigned after that. She dabbed at her face with her fistful of tissues while listening to the sound of traffic out on the busy street.

"And what did you feel at that moment?" Yolanda asked.

Hermione sighed. "Guilty," she whispered. "I felt terribly guilty." She shook her head. "He was so tender and loving. I'd never seen that side of him before. I didn't even think it could exist inside such a nasty man. He was like a little boy with a treasure. I couldn't explain. I couldn't do anything. I was biting my tongue to stay silent because I couldn't trust what would come out of my mouth." She opened her hands and the tissues tumbled out into her lap. "I just wanted him to shut up. Everything he said just made it more awful. I couldn't even hate him anymore."

"What _did_ you feel for him in that instant?"

She held her breath a moment. "Pity," she spat, and then she threw her hand up. "No, you know what? I pitied both of us. In that moment I just thought it was so pathetic that I wasn't who he wanted me to be."

"Why did you pity yourself?"

She swallowed around the lump in her throat. "Because I'd had such a _crush_ on him when we started. He managed to kill that dead in the first months, and I eventually found the thought sort of embarrassing. But the things he said that night… the side of him that he showed me…" She scrunched her face up. "It sort of brought that early fancy back with a vengeance. Even while it was happening, I felt… I just felt so bad for him and sad for myself. I would have really liked _that_ Snape. We could have... We might have been something, if life had ever given us a decent chance." She shrugged and looked up, embarrassed, but was met with Yolanda's warm, sympathetic eyes.

"That makes it all seem even worse, doesn't it?" the psychologist said in a gentle voice.

Hermione's lip trembled as she nodded, and she grabbed for a fresh tissue.

* * *

Hermione walked in, sat in her comfy chair and snatched a tissue out of the dispenser.

"I was thinking about where we left off last week. You know, about Snape and I having a toxic relationship."

Yolanda smiled. "Good, although the term I used was 'mutually abusive.'"

Hermione waved the tissue in the air. "True, but toxic sounds more apt."

Yolanda nodded and conceded the term with an elegant wave of her dark hand. "What have you come up with on the subject?"

"Just more questions," she admitted.

"Such as?"

"Could it have been sexual tension the whole time?"

"Do you think he could have been attracted to you for two years and you not know it?"

Hermione slumped in her chair. "Well, no. Not when you put it that way." She began twisting her tissue. "I mean, it's not like the thought never occurred to me. To wonder, I mean. You know, any time you spend a lot of time with a man you sort of… wonder what they'd be like to kiss. Sometimes I had the feeling he was… watching me. Not pervy, but, you know, the way a bloke does when he's contemplating asking a girl out for a drink." She shook her head. "But then he would open his mouth and that would be that. I think I stopped even thinking of him as human, never mind male, after those first months I worked for him." She sighed heavily.

"You sound like your disappointed it _wasn't_ a frustrated attraction that caused the two of you to snipe at each other all the time."

She huffed. "I'm just trying to find an explanation. You asked me to come up with one, and I'm doing my best."

Yolanda smiled and lifted her hand in an encouraging gesture.

"It just seems sort of… stupid, when you think about it. I mean, the man's utterly brilliant, and I was honored to be chosen to work with him, and we spent two years shrieking at each other." She waved her knotted tissue. "I just feel like I wasted time."

There was a silence after that.

"When did the sniping start?" Yolanda asked after a while.

Hermione looked over at the diffused light coming from the window shade. "When I was eleven, really." She gave a weak laugh. "Snape was always a bastard. He's brilliant, but he's also a bully who threw his weight around. He always seemed to take great pleasure in putting us all in our place."

"What was your place?"

She shrugged. "Who knows? At first we thought he just hated us on principal. But the more we learned about him, the more we understood he was carrying a grudge. After the war, I understood how much pressure he was under. The incredible strain. Now I can see why he would lash out."

"Why?"

"For control, don't you think? His life was completely out of his control. I think throwing his weight around made him feel less powerless."

Yolanda nodded. "It's not uncommon in bullies."

"He had a terrible childhood, did you know that?"

"No, I didn't."

"I don't know everything, but what I know is awful. His home life was dreadful. His father was a drinker. His parents used to argue all the time. He was bullied himself in school… almost killed in a nasty prank."

"It sounds like he's earned your sympathy, if not your respect."

Hermione blinked. " _Of course_ I respect him."

"Then why did you argue with him for two years?"

"Because he's exasperating!"

"How so? How did you go from respecting him enough to apply for an apprenticeship with him, to insulting or flat out ignoring him when he's trying to talk to you?"

Hermione looked down at her lap. "I don't know," she mumbled. "I wanted to impress him at first, but it quickly grew apparent that that was never going to happen. He wouldn't listen to my ideas. He wouldn't look at my personal research. He never let me do any independent studies at all until that last six months."

"That must have made you feel a bit powerless yourself."

Hermione grimaced. "It did."

Yolanda nodded. "Tell me how you went about getting your power back."

Hermione looked up and then tilted her head to the side. "By ignoring him when I could, and yelling back when I couldn't."

"How did you feel when you yelled back at him?"

She nodded, understanding. "It was liberating. I felt strong. Not many people could say they could hold their own against him. Even the Headmistress avoided him when he was in a temper."

"Tell me, how soon after the battle did you take up your apprenticeship?"

"Not quite a year. As soon as the school was rebuilt."

"And we've talked about how powerless you felt before and after the battle, haven't we?"

Hermione's stomach knotted up, seeing where this was going. "Are you saying I became a bully too?"

"I'm saying that perhaps the dynamic between the two of you was influenced by the war in more ways than you considered."

She was quiet for a long time. Finally, she looked up and whispered. "I think I don't like myself very much right now."

"Why?"

She took several deep breaths. "Because I don't like the idea that he didn't deserve it. It makes me feel like I hurt him even before… that night."

* * *

Hermione entered the office and sat down in the chair. "Sorry I had to cancel my appointment last week, work is being a bugbear."

"How _is_ work?"

"Wonderful. I'm involved in the most incredible project dealing with curse damage reversal. We've been able to not just regenerate tissue that's been cursed, but actually make the spell work _backwards_. It's like watching a movie in reverse!"

"How fascinating!"

"I know! Isn't it? I just wish—"

"What?"

Hermione looked down and realized she didn't have a tissue in her hand. "I just wish I could share it with Snape. I know he would have been interested."

"Didn't you once say he had a specialty in curse damage?"

Hermione nodded. "He hinted once that he'd learned by necessity. He said he was his own practicum." She reached for a tissue.

"And that knowledge affects you?"

"Why wouldn't it? It's horrible to contemplate. I've been in on consultations for curse damage. It's one thing to read about it and learn to brew a remedy, and it's quite another to actually see the damage. And then I remember him casually mentioning healing himself from something that turns my stomach to look at. It's hideous enough in a hospital. He was _alone._ He had no one! Not even presents!" This last came out of nowhere, and she looked up, blushing furiously and feeling foolish.

Yolanda just waited with a patient expression.

"I need to find him," Hermione blurted. "I need to know he's okay. It's been over eight months, and no one's seen him!"

"Have you been looking?"

She grimaced. "I've asked around, but no. I'm too chicken to look myself."

Yolanda shook her head. "That's not chicken, that's smart."

"What do you mean?"

Yolanda sat forward and rested her elbows on her knees, splaying her open hands. "Hermione, from what you've told me, Professor Snape expressed a very appropriate amount of shock and horror when he finally understood what was happening. He took immediate steps to help you. That shows that he's a decent person at heart. However, you've also told me he's lived a life of emotional deprivation and was deeply affected by the illusion that you loved him. From his perspective, he made love to a woman that seemed to find value in him, only to discover that he'd actually raped her. This would cripple a strong man, and you've never described him as being strong."

"He _is_ strong! He's amazingly strong!"

"Physically, perhaps, but not emotionally." Yolanda tilted her head to the side. "Torturing a confession out of the perpetrator and dumping him on your doorstep was not a rational act."

"It seemed rational enough to me."

"He drove pieces of the man's wand through his hands."

"So?"

"Hermione, that was an extremely violent thing to do. To me, it shows an unstable personality."

"He was pushed beyond his limit!"

"Agreed. Now imagine what he would be capable of if he were to be cornered now. The two of you had a history of getting up each others' noses. Then this happened. How do you think he would react to seeing you again?"

"How do we know he hasn't had help? Like you and me? Maybe he's worked it all out."

"He might just have, and I do hope that is the case, however British Wizards are even more reluctant to work through their emotional issues than their Muggle counterparts, and that's saying something. Nevertheless let's say that he has. Let's go with the idea that he _has_ had a chance to work through his trauma. What do we know about him since the incident?"

"Nothing! It's like he's dropped off the planet!"

Yolanda gave her a patient, meaningful look. "Exactly," she said in a quiet voice. "Either he is still out there, trying to come to terms with what happened on his own, which leaves open the possibility that he is still emotionally devastated with the potential to become violently unstable, or he has come to terms with it and made a conscious choice to not be a part of society anymore for his own reasons. Reasons that you will have to respect."

Hermione curled in on herself, bobbing her foot up and down rapidly. "What about all that talk about closure? Maybe I need to know if he's alright in order to get closure!"

Yolanda shook her head slowly. "We've been talking about finding ways, yes, but facing him might not ever be possible."

"Why not?"

"Because he might not ever want to see you. Or you might not ever find him. Closure isn't always the same as satisfaction."

"I don't want satisfaction from him! I just want to be sure he's okay! I want—" Hermione caught herself up short and lowered her voice. She took a deep breath and let it go. "I just want to tell him I'm sorry."

"For what? Tell me what you would say."

"I want to say I'm sorry I was such a nasty cow. I'm sorry I was stupid enough to get cursed! I'm sorry I told him I loved him!" She started to cry. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I hurt him so badly. I need to know he's alright! I need to know he's got past it!" She moaned around the pain in her chest and curled herself even tighter. "I can't get the look on his face out of my head."

"When he realized you were cursed?"

"No," she said, weeping. "When he heard me say I loved him…"

Yolanda blew out a slow breath. "Clearly, we have a few more things to discuss before we get to closure."

* * *

Hermione looked at the little rosette she'd made out of the tissue and vaguely wondered if she could make a daffodil.

"I looked last night," she said in a quiet voice.

That was met with a long pause before Yolanda said, "Were you alone?"

"No. Ron stayed. He was there to catch me when I came back out of the pensieve."

"Good. He's a good friend."

"He really is. I wish he could be more, but we tried that once and… Well, I was too much of a bitch."

"It was just after the war."

Hermione waved her hand, dismissing that topic.

"How are you feeling right now?" Yolanda asked.

Some decorative tearing on the edges of the petals added verisimilitude. "Depressed, actually."

"Tell me."

A petal accidentally tore off and Hermione crushed the flower in disgust and looked up. "He was completely blind-sided."

"Snape?"

"Yeah. I mean, it was so different to watch it from outside of my head. It wasn't as obvious as I thought. Well, I wasn't myself, that much was obvious, but it was also obvious that he was completely bleutered. And he really wouldn't have had any way of knowing what I acted like when I _was_ being friendly, would he?"

"How did you act?"

"Like a total slag. I was dressed like a skank. I'd even charmed my sexiest bit of lingerie to be green. How trite is that? And I…" She sighed, shaking her head. "I totally jumped him. I didn't even remember how many times he'd protested. I literally backed him into a wall and grabbed the bull by the horns, so to speak."

"You were under a curse that compelled aggressive sexual behavior."

Hermione flapped her hand again. "Oh, I know."

"You weren't to blame."

"I know."

"So what hurts so much?"

She sagged against the back of the chair. "It's him. It's always him, isn't it? His face when I told him I loved him. His face when he realized I didn't. His face when I told him I didn't want to stay in the castle anymore." She dropped her head, listlessly. "He tried to be noble. He _was_ noble. I ridiculed him for it. I tried to tell him I appreciated it, but it came out backwards, so it sounded like ridicule." She lifted her head and stared out the window. "He caught on by the end. I think he knew what I was really trying to say. Then, when it was all over, I didn't have it in me to try and explain. I just abandoned him to his own pain and ran."

"Hermione, you weren't capable of consoling him at the time. You weren't capable of that much rational thought. Don't put that on yourself."

"I know. I really do."

"What else hurts?"

Hermione lifted another tissue out, slowly scraping it against the edge of the dispenser until it came free. "He was so tender…" she whispered. "He really is a wonderful lover."

"You're still attracted to him."

She nodded. "Not like before. I don't want to find him and fix him just so I can fix myself. It's not that anymore."

"What do you think it is?"

Hermione shrugged.

Yolanda waited.

"I just kind of want to… sleep with him. You know? Do it again, but the right way, and maybe it would fix it. Like with computers when you reboot the system. Or maybe it's not even that deep. I think I just want to shag him and see what it would be like."

"See what it would be like? Or show him what it could be like?"

"Does it have to be one or the other?"

* * *

"And I was halfway through Diagon Alley when I realized I didn't even have my wand in my hand."

"How did that make you feel?"

Hermione smiled. "Free." She lifted her empty hands up. "I realized I wasn't afraid of some random stranger popping out of nowhere and cursing me anymore. It felt wonderful." She dropped her hands back to her lap. "I mean, I still have moments, but they don't seem so dark. I just remember that, statistically, the chances of me being assaulted again are minimal, right? The world isn't picking on me because I'm Hermione Granger."

"That's quite a leap. I'm very proud of you."

"Thanks. I'm rather proud of myself, actually."

"Good," Yolanda said with a warm chuckle. "And how are your dreams?"

"Boring actually. Most of the time, I can't recall what I've been dreaming. Is that bad?"

Yolanda chuckled again. "That's actually quite normal."

"Oh, good."

"And how are things with you and the gentleman you went out with? Have you seen him again?"

Hermione smiled. "Lee? I have. It's nice. Things are nice."

"Nice?"

She flushed. "Nice is good, isn't it?"

"Absolutely."

"I mean, after everything, the war, the curse, how upside down my life has become, I kind of like something as simple as 'nice'. He's clever, and funny and a bit outrageous, and he makes me feel cared for. What more would anyone want?"

"That sounds like a good deal right there. Are you two getting serious?"

Hermione shrugged. "I think so. I think I'd like to."

"Good. I'm glad. And how is work going?"

She grinned. "I got that project I was telling you about. I beat out three other candidates."

"Excellent! That must make you proud."

"It does. I knew I could do it, and they're so excited about my proposal! I start picking my staff next week."

"Fantastic. And what about Snape? You haven't mentioned him since the anniversary. Where do you stand with him?"

Hermione sighed. "I still feel wretched about the whole thing when I do think about it. I'm not angry anymore, and I'm not desperate to apologize like I had been. I've come to terms with the fact that something terrible happened to both of us. I just feel… I just wish it had never happened. That probably sounds daft; anyone who's had something bad happen to them wishes it never happened, I'm sure."

"It sounds like you have created a bit of healthy distance from it."

Hermione nodded. "That's what it is. Distance. It's in the past now. I'm not living it every moment of the day. It's just a dark thing that's there for me to contemplate, or not. Like the war."

"That sounds suspiciously like closure, to me."

Hermione smiled. "It does, doesn't it?" Her smile dropped. "Does that mean we're done?"

Yolanda laughed warmly. "I'm always here, don't worry. However, why don't we make our next appointment for a month from now and see how things go?"

She blew out the breath she'd been holding. "Alright. That sounds good."

They set the time and date of their next appointment and Hermione pushed out of the chair and picked up her pocketbook. She reached out her hand to shake, but instead, impulsively hugged Yolanda instead. She felt at peace as the other woman hugged her and rocked her back and forth slightly.

"Thank you," she whispered.

"You are very welcome, Hermione."


	4. Thou Hast the Keys of Paradise

**AN:** For the worried, this is the last truly dark chapter. For the rabid, chap spam commencing... _now._

* * *

Snape added two drams of aconite and then vigorously stirred. He clenched his other hand and shoved it in his pocket to hide the trembling. A glance at the clock told him it had been four hours since his tea break.

Damn.

He clenched his teeth together and pushed on, watching the brew clarify and then turn creamy white.

He pulled it off the burner and set it on the worktop to cool before turning to inspect the other cauldron.

"Andrew!"

Checking the viscosity, he deemed it ready. He fetched a few racks of vials and began measuring it out into individual doses.

"Andrew!"

When the cauldron was empty, he stoppered the vials and set them aside, thinking to leave off labeling them until later. He paused. Better to do it now. His hands might be shaking too badly later.

He grabbed up a quill and popped open his jar of ink.

" _Andrew,_ damn it! What the hell is the matter with you?"

Snape looked up. "I'm sorry?"

Torvald Skyler was standing before him with his hands on his hips. "I've been calling you for five minutes!" He leaned in and looked at Snape's face. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

Snape swallowed down the anger that wanted to rupture to the surface and pushed away the cutting remark that wanted to burst forth. He shoved away the resentment. The shame. The endless guilt. He pushed everything away. He needed this job. It was the last one left.

"My apologies, I was concentrating. What can I do for you?"

"We're out of Toothache Remedy. I need you to brew up three gallons. You'll have to stay late to get it done."

Snape clenched his jaw tight. He _needed_ this job. He allowed only the merest hint of contempt to slip into the wave of his hand toward the racks of vials. "I'm labeling them now."

Skyler flushed red. "Oh. Fine, then. In that case, when you're done with the Wart Remover, you can leave."

Snape turned back to his work a fraction of a second too soon to be polite. It was too close to being a dismissal.

Skyler snarled and whirled away.

Picking up a vial, he began labeling it, careful to use block print. Too many ex-students knew his penmanship. He paused, mesmerized by the way the tip of the feather quivered in his trembling hand. He stared at it for a small eternity.

:

The door to the apothecary closed behind him with a solid thump and a click of the lock. Snape pulled his hood over his head and set off down the street. A quick look around showed no one following him as he slipped into Knockturn. He slunk down the alley, avoiding the other inhabitants, and made his way to a dark, moldy door with cracked paint. Pushing it open, he climbed the stairs to the third floor garret. It had been separated into six tiny flats by the addition of flimsy walls, and the sounds of babies crying, couples shouting, and whores earning were the subtle white noise of his life now.

He un-warded the door at the end of the canted hallway and was home. Re-warding the door, he put up a Silencing Charm and pulled the medallion from around his neck. Watching in the clouded mirror, he saw his features change from a handsome, if blunt-faced, man with thick, sandy curls to a hatchet-faced loser. He sneered and hung the medallion on a rusty nail by the door.

He walked over to the scarred table, emptying his pockets, kicking off his boots, and stripping out of his tan robes. With a heavy sigh, he made his way to the lumpy bed with its stained coverlet. The drawer of the bedside table seemed to actually call out to him, and not for the first time he contemplated backing away, resisting, denying himself what he wanted. He looked around at the four walls that enclosed his existence and shrugged the thought away. Why? What was the point?

Instead, he sat down and pulled the drawer open, staring at his carefully crafted new love and her shiny accessories. He took a moment to mentally prepare and then set about his routine. Within moments, he was lying on his side, blissfully unaware that his arm was bleeding or that he'd vomited again.

All he cared about was that he was gone.

In his mind, he was running free across a field of bright-green new hay, laughing under a vivid blue sky. With a shout of triumph, he sprouted golden wings and flew away.

* * *

Hermione pushed her way into the shop, accompanied by the pleasant ringing of a bell.

A large man with a florid face, a shock of white hair, and a pleasant smile greeted her from behind the counter. "Hello! How can I help you today?"

She pushed the hood of her cloak off her head and returned the smile. "I have an appointment with Festus Bigby. I'm Hermione Jordan."

"Of course! Mrs. Jordan! I didn't recognize you in person." He held out his meaty hand. "I'm Festus Bigby."

"It's lovely to finally meet you, Mr. Bigby."

"And you as well. It's very kind of you to come to us. I'm very excited about learning this new formula and terribly sorry my master brewer didn't make it to the training seminar you held. He must have got the days mixed up. We're always willing to make stock for St. Mungo's."

"It's no problem at all. I had the time. But I'm curious, I thought you were the master brewer."

Bigby smiled and spread his hands. "My legs won't take all that standing anymore. I'm more involved with the running of things these days. I haven't been behind the bench in years. I don't even train apprentices anymore. No, I leave the tricky work to those more capable."

"Who do you have currently?"

There was something in the man's eyes, a hesitation before he answered, that caught Hermione's attention.

"Stern. Andrew Stern."

She scrunched up her face and then shook her head. "I've never heard of him. Is he published?"

"Oh, he's excellent. Over-qualified, if you ask me. He was one of my apprentices years ago, but likes to keep a low profile. I doubt you've ever read any of his work."

"How long has he been with you?"

"Just over a year now. Come. I'll have you meet him." He called out to the rabbit-faced man stocking shelves. "Skyler, keep an eye on things, will you?"

"Yes, sir."

"Right this way, Mrs. Jordan."

She followed him through the shop and through a cluttered office into the lab in the back. A tall, blonde man with a broad back and thick arms was scrubbing out an iron number thirty. There was a stack of dirty cauldrons awaiting their turn. The man was either a prolific brewer or a lazy one to let this many cauldrons stack up. Her opinions of proper lab procedure had been mortared and set by Snape, and as she scanned the lab, she found at least ten things to find fault with. Snape would have eaten this man alive.

"Andrew! Come greet Mrs. Jordan, from St. Mungo's."

Stern nodded and reached for a towel to dry his hands. She noticed a slight palsy, an odd ailment for a brewer where exactitude could be the difference between potion or poison. Her opinion of the man bounced even lower. What sort of quality would the product have? St. Mungo's needed better than 'cobbled together offhandedly.'

He turned, and she gave him a bland smile as she walked over to him. "It's an honor to have this chance to work with you," she lied, lifting her hand in greeting.

Stern's black eyes widened in surprise at first, and then went wider in total and complete panic. She froze, still in the process of reaching out to him. _His eyes…_ "You…!" _But it couldn't be…_

" _No!_ " he cried, eyes wild and terrified. "Not again!" He backed into the stack of cauldrons, setting off a cacophony of clanging as they fell. In a blink, his wand was out and aimed at her. "Take her to St. Mungo's immediately! Get her out of here! Get her the fuck _away_ from me!"

Hermione threw up her hands to try and calm him and turned to Mr. Bigby to demand an explanation.

She didn't see the Stupefy that hit her.

:

She woke up on a low camp bed and groaned.

"Mrs. Jordan? Are you alright? Here, drink this."

She blinked several times to clear her vision and found Mr. Bigby kneeling down next to her holding out a small vial of Headache Remedy and a glass of water. She took both gratefully. A glance around the lab showed a floor was still littered with upended cauldrons, but of 'Andrew Stern,' there was no sign.

"Where is he?"

The man shook his head. "I don't know. He was raving and then ran out the back door as if the hounds of hell were after him. I'm very sorry. This is most embarrassing. Nothing like this has ever happened before."

She handed the glass back to Bigby and looked him straight in the eye. "Why didn't you tell me his real name?"

"Whatever do you mean?"

"I know that was Severus Snape, I worked with him too long not to recognize his eyes."

Bigby flushed and stood up, wandlessly calling a chair over to sit in. He sighed heavily. "He didn't want anyone to know who he was. I didn't see the harm. He's never caused any trouble before. Well, not major trouble. He's a good brewer."

"He's more than a brewer, he's the best _potioner_ in Britain," she snapped. "He taught me everything I know."

Bigby nodded. "There's a bond there. I understand. You were his first apprentice. He was mine."

"Did you tell him I was coming? Did he know it was me?"

"I assumed so. He didn't seem particularly bothered when we spoke. He likes learning new things, especially potions that deal with curse reversal."

Hermione ran her hands through her hair. "Did you tell him _I_ was coming, or only Mrs. Jordan?"

Bigby looked at her, confused. "I might have only called you Mrs. Jordan, but everyone knows who you are."

"Not if they don't read the papers."

Bigby grimaced. "I don't understand. Why should it have made a difference? I wasn't aware you two had a bad history. He never mentioned it."

"Did he ever mention me at all?"

"Not that I recall, no." Bigby shook his head sadly. "He never talks much, to be honest. He's always had his demons, even when he was a young lad."

She winced. "You hinted that there had been minor trouble with him. What sort of trouble?"

Bigby seemed to balk at answering but then shook his head and sighed. "He has health issues. He treats them on his own with mixed results. Occasionally he will oversleep, like he did the day of your seminar. Once in a while he will come in disoriented, but I always send him back home when that happens. The only real complaint was that he would occasionally pilfer my stock, but after the last time I had to speak with him, he stopped. I've never seen him act so irrationally before."

Hermione pondered the trembling hands and the neglected lab. _What had happened to him?_

"Do you know where he would have gone?" she asked.

"I can only assume he went home."

"Do you know where he lives?" Hermione knew Snape had sold Spinner's End after the war. His only other home as far as she'd known had been Hogwarts.

Bigby nodded. "I have his current address on file."

It wasn't until after Bigby left to go and fetch it that Hermione began to violently shake.

:

The two cloaked figures made their way through Knockturn Alley, looking in vain for address markers.

"Can I just express again how stupid this is?"

"I'd rather you not."

"Could we at least wait for Harry? Another Auror wouldn't be remiss in this situation, you know."

"No. You didn't see his face. He was out of his _mind_. I feel like something terrible is going to happen if I wait."

Ron reached out and grabbed her arm, stopping her. "Hermione," he hissed in a low voice. "This is irrational. You're scaring me a little. You didn't even tell Lee where you were going."

The image of terrified black eyes trapped in the wrong face filled her with burning urgency. "I have to," she hissed. "I can't wait, and Lee wouldn't understand. He still blames Snape for what happened. I never should have told him."

She snatched her arm back and went to find someone to ask about directions.

Ron pulled at her again when they reached the top floor of a run-down building. The noise all around them seemed to almost bounce off the door marked, 306. Beyond it, it was deathly silent. No one answered a knock. At an impatient gesture from her, Ron made short work of dropping the wards—she'd told him which ones Snape had used in the past—and pushed the door open gently. The place was a tip and smelled of mold and vomit. They waited several heartbeats, but nothing happened. Ron ducked down and slipped around the doorjamb.

"Bloody hell," he said in a low voice.

Hermione dashed in behind him and gasped.

Snape was lying on the floor, undressed down to his smalls, atrophied, skeletal legs splayed akimbo, painfully thin chest covered in vomit. Boney shoulders were propped against the bed, and a Muggle syringe was lying on the floor by his arm. A length of rubber tubing was wrapped loosely above his elbow. His head slumped on his too-thin neck, and his bruised, still-open eyes stared sightlessly at the floor through his lank, filthy hair. His face was as gaunt and pale as a skull, and his lips were... blue. Her eyes watched his chest, willing it to lift and fall, desperate for a sign he was breathing.

He wasn't.

"Too late," she whispered, not even noticing she had folded to the floor at his feet. "Oh, my gods, I was too late." Pain stabbed at her, and she wrapped her arms around her stomach and started to keen.

Three years. It had been over three years since she'd fled his office in shame. In that time she'd struggled and won out over her pain and shame. She'd become someone important in her field. A field he'd opened up for her. She'd even found someone and married, and while it was far from perfect, it was a constant that she craved. There was even talk of starting a family.

In those same three years, _this_ was what had become of him. _This_ was what he'd been left with. _This_ had been his escape.

His face, all his faces, began to cycle through her mind, crowding out everything else and leaving only guilt and pain and horror in their place. His anger, his joy, his ecstasy, his revulsion, his shame, his nobility. She saw him thrashing on the floor again, bleeding from the neck. She saw him snarling at her and Vanishing her potion with contempt. She saw him above her with his head thrown back in erotic bliss. She saw an incredibly open smile slide from his face before it morphed into an expression of such abject horror that her mind tried to shy away from it in vain. She saw him and saw him and saw him, and didn't even know her keen had become a wail.

There was a crack of Apparition, but she ignored it.

:

Harry's voice slipped through the pain. He was saying something over and over, and she blinked and tried to read his lips.

"He's alive. He's alive. Hermione, please come back to us."

She blinked and looked around, finding herself in the sitting room of Grimmauld. Ginny was sitting across from her holding out a cup of tea.

"He's alive?"

Ginny nodded and tears sprang into her eyes as she sighed. "Drink this. It's just tea."

She took the cup. "He's alive?" she repeated.

"Barely. If you'd been any later we'd have lost him. Ron took him to St. Mungo's. He's still with him. They have to try and figure out what he was on before they can flush it out of his system. It appears to be something he invented himself."

She took a swallow of tea and set it down. "I can help! I know the tests they need to run! I have to go see him."

She jumped up, but Harry grabbed her arm and pulled her back down. "No. You have to wait here. You're about to have a visitor."

She tilted her head to the side. "Who?"

Harry grimaced. "Ginny got Dr. Peeple's name from your wallet. She's on her way over right now." He shrugged. "It was that or take you to St. Mungo's and check you in. I thought this was a better idea."

Hermione nodded and then collapsed against Harry's arm.

"Do you want me to get Lee?" Ginny asked. "Ron said we should ask you first before we contacted him."

Hermione shook her head. "Not yet. Lee wouldn't understand."

* * *

She sat on the bench in the hallway and rocked back and forth. It had been a week and a half since they'd found Snape. Ten days of white-knuckle anxiety; huge, blow-up fights with her husband; and daily phone calls with Yolanda to keep her sane, while the hospital staff fought to clear Snape's body of all the poisons.

She'd just started to find normalcy amidst the insanity when she'd received a message from the fifth floor. ' _Mr Snape would like to speak with you at your convenience_.'

So here she was, conveniently having another anxiety attack while she sat outside his room. The door opened and a nurse came out. "Mrs. Jordan? You can go in now. Ten minutes only."

"Alright," she said, rising from the bench. She took a moment to gather her scattered wits and to try and calm the escalating panic. She'd been the one to send him a note first, telling him she was here if he wanted to talk. It was stupid for her to lose it just because he'd taken her up on her offer.

She knocked and pushed the door open. "Professor?" she called, knowing she sounded terrified. The room was dimly lit. He'd always seemed to like things dimly lit. It had always been obvious it gave him eye strain, which caused him headaches, but she sure as hell wasn't going to give him grief about it anymore.

"Come in. Miss Granger."

She followed the voice around a corner and found him sitting in a chair, staring out the window. He looked terrible. Worse than terrible. If he weighed seven stone, it was a miracle. His skin was sallow, hair even more lank, if possible, and his kneecaps poked almost painfully into the folds of his hospital robes.

He raised a thin, trembling hand—the bones of his wrist protruding from the skin—and gestured to the facing chair.

"How are you?" she asked when she was seated.

"Don't you already know?"

She shook her head. "I work here, but that doesn't give me access to patient records. I know nothing." She sighed. "I wanted to pry. I'm sure I could have, but I didn't think you would want me to. It seemed too much like a violation, and we've had enough of that, haven't we?"

He looked at her then. His eyes were mild, and she wondered if he was sedated. He nodded to her. "Indeed." He flicked imaginary lint off his robes. "I owe you an apology," he said quietly.

"No, you don't."

There was a flash of anger in his eyes but it faded quickly. Definitely sedated.

"You were ambushed," she said. "I can easily understand why you would have acted on your fears when confronted with me suddenly walking up on you again."

He tilted his head to the side. "Can you?"

She nodded, not bothering to explain with more words. She wasn't sure how many were getting through the fog of medication.

He shifted in the chair. "I… I've been unstable," he said, darting a look at her. "Paranoid…" He sighed. "I wasn't myself at the time. I find it galling that I hurt you again."

"So do I," she replied in a whisper. "I was crushed when I realized I'd been the cause of more torment for you." He stared at her in surprise, and she shook her head. "I was always a torment to you in one form or another, wasn't I?" She took a deep breath, plunging on. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I was such a bitch. I'm sorry I didn't respect you. I'm sorry I didn't take better advantage of what you had to teach me those two years." She couldn't stop the tears from welling up, so she tried to keep them from falling by looking up at the ceiling. "I'm so sorry I couldn't fight the curse, couldn't figure out how to clue you in, or stop you from misunderstanding. I'm so, _so_ sorry."

He folded his arms around his stomach and leaned forward a little. "It wasn't your fault," he said quietly. "I should have known."

She violently shook her head, pausing to dash the tears from her eyes. "No. I went back and looked." He recoiled and she nodded. "It wasn't easy, but I did finally get to a place where I could. It was all so different from what I'd thought. You were drunk, and I was… aggressive. I don't think it would have been easy for you to notice in your condition at the time." She leaned closer to him, not too much. "There was no fault in us. No blame between us. We were victims. It was all Thornseed's fault." She closed her eyes and looked down. "And, gods help me, I've been told I should be better than this, but you took care of that bastard, and I will always be grateful for that."

He was silent for a long moment before he asked, "You really don't find me to blame?"

She winced. "No. I don't. I admit I was angry with you for a long time afterwards, but I really was just furious that it had happened at all, and you were convenient to blame because we'd hated each other so much towards the end."

Again the silence seemed to press her against her chair.

"I didn't," he said quietly. She looked up at him in surprise, and he grimaced. "Oh, I admit I might not have spit on you had you burst into flames. On second thought, I might have taken far too much delight in beating the flames out. Nevertheless, the truth was I was proud of you." He gave her a weak twitch of his lips. "I still am, for what it's worth." He waved a skeletal hand towards the sounds of people scurrying down the hall. "I've been given to understand that you've already become a force to be reckoned with, and you're only at the start of your career. For the rest of my days I get to point to each of your successes and say, 'I did that.'"

He smirked, and she looked down at her lap and bit her lip. "Thank you. That means a great deal."

"Does it? Then I'm glad," he said. "I'm glad you've moved on. That eases a burden. I was properly hacked off when you didn't sit for your mastery on schedule. I was afraid I'd ruined everything for you. I had hoped you had the stones to go through with it anyway just to prove you couldn't be beaten." He sighed. "But then you canceled the examination…"

She shook her head, looking down and fiddling with the cuff of her sleeve. "I would have failed. I _was_ beaten. It took me six months to get myself together and take it."

He snorted and then turned his face toward the window. "I admire your strength. It took me six months to tear myself completely apart."

She reached out but stopped short, and they both stared at their hands as if wondering what they would do next. He finally lifted his and patted her. His touch was cool and papery. So different from before.

"I had help, you know," she said.

"You always had strong friendships," he replied.

"I did at that, but it wasn't enough. McGonagall gave me the name of a psychologist. She's a squib, so she understands our… peculiarities. Without her, I would probably still be curled into a ball hiding in Harry's house."

"How did she help?"

"She let me talk. It sounds simplistic, but it helped. I mean, just imagine being able to say anything you wanted to someone and they don't judge you. It was enormously helpful. I saw her weekly for about fifteen months. I'm not going to lie, it took time. There were some things that were harder to get past then others."

"May I ask what was the worst?"

She bit her lip and darted a look at his eyes and realized he was waiting for a hammer blow.

She sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. "The fear, probably. The fear that I would be walking through a store, or a pub, or down the street, and suddenly I would be trapped by a curse." He nodded in understanding. "No. That part was the hardest to get past. It wasn't the worst. The worst was," her voice dropped into a whisper, "how much I hurt you." She swallowed around the lump in her throat. "You were so… _happy,_ and it was all a lie. I couldn't stand to think about how deeply you must have been hurt. I felt like I'd raped _you_."

He sighed and pulled his hand back and that small action cut her. "Miss Granger, you should know that at the time I was out of my skull on absinthe that I'd doctored up with enhanced alpha-thujone."

She tilted her head to the side and then her eyes widened in understanding. "Isn't that an hallucinogen?"

"It is."

She frowned. "Why on earth would you do that to yourself?"

He sneered. "I liked the pretty colors," he drawled with a hint of his old bite.

Despite herself, she snorted, and then had to smother a laugh. "You _prat_. No wonder it didn't seem odd that I would stroll up on you half-naked. I had no idea you indulged in such things. You always seemed like such a prig."

"Obviously you didn't really know me."

She stilled, feeling foolish for laughing. "No. I don't think we knew each other at all." She sighed and looked down at her lap. "I never tried. I was too busy thinking I already knew you." She peeked back up at him through her lashes. "My understanding certainly never included a fondness for colors."

He smirked, and his eyes glittered with something that looked suspiciously like humor. He raised his hand and waved it languidly in front of his face, and she watched his eyes track it slowly. "I have permanent trails now. I can see colors whenever I bloody well feel like it. Anyway, the point is, my emotional reaction to having a beautiful woman fall into my lap and tell me she loved me might have been a little over the top from the drugs and alcohol. Don't beat yourself up about it too much."

She barked a dark laugh. "Oh, it's far too late for that. I shall just try to not beat myself up about it too much in the future."

There was a knock on the door and the nurse called, "Mrs. Jordan, time's up, if you please."

"Alright," she called back. She reached into the pocket of her robes and pulled out a card, handing it to Snape. "This is the name of the woman that basically saved my sanity. You can call, or not call. I'll never know. But I thought it might help if you had someone you could talk to that already understood." He took the card and looked at it as she stood up.

She placed her hand on his shoulder, feeling the sharp bones. It didn't seem like the same body at all. "Please get better, Professor. I really would like the honor of bitching about you when you show me up at a potions conference."

He snorted and rewarded her with a smirk. "I shall endeavor to do so, Miss Granger."

"Thank you. Thank you for seeing me. Thank you for allowing me to apologize and for giving me the chance to tell you all is truly forgiven."

He sighed, and then reached up and patted her hand again. "You are a remarkable young woman, Hermione. I wish you luck in life."

:

Hermione sat at her lab bench and stared at the wall, desperately hopeful that their conversation would help him to begin to lay their past to rest. She'd walked away from his room feeling almost giddy with relief, but that had quickly faded, leaving her feeling markedly disturbed and uneasy. She'd returned to her lab and broke her own unspoken vow, requisitioning Snape's toxicology report first and wheedling his medicals records out of a friend next.

She shook her head, marveling at both the man's genius and stupidity. He'd managed to create a synthetic form of heroin and enhance it with LSD. There were trace elements that showed that he'd also managed to create a potion that would counteract the addictive properties. It wasn't the drugs that had caused the palsy, but what he was taking to counteract the drugs so he could function.

Worse, by far, was the notation where it confirmed that his overdose _hadn't_ been accidental, not with the amount he'd taken. This fact was like a punch in the stomach all over again. She recalled Yolanda's counsel, unwanted at the time, explaining why it would be dangerous to seek him out. She knew now that she really hadn't understood the gravity of the situation, although she had accepted the woman's word on the matter.

She really _didn't_ know him at all.

' _He always had his demons, even as a young lad_ ,' Bigby had said.

She felt stupid. Why had it been such a shock for her to find he was so fragile? That he was basically a junkie? With his biography, why was it surprising?

She shook her head. That wasn't what was really bothering her.

What had her completely out of sorts were two interrelated things that she took away from the conversation. First, that he had referred to her as beautiful. It was almost embarrassing how much her mind chewed that over. Second, was his revelation about being under the influence of a drug that night.

She'd looked up alpha-thujone while she'd been waiting for Snape's reports. A compound found in wormwood, alpha-thujone was a trace ingredient in absinthe. Using it in its pure form was utter lunacy. Traces could enhance emotions and cause mild visual and auditory hallucinations. Larger quantities could invent emotions out of thin air and leave a person permanently schizophrenic.

Hermione was left with the realization that Snape most likely hadn't meant _any_ of the things he'd said that night. It was more than probable that he'd had no control over his reactions at all. She should have felt liberated. The idea that Snape had been devastated to find out she didn't really love him had haunted her, and one would think that finding out his reaction was fraudulent at best should have been a relief.

Instead, she felt… bereft.

The truth and lies from that night had become excruciatingly convoluted. The only constant, aside from the fact that they'd shagged, was that he'd called her beautiful that night, and he'd called her beautiful again today.

It shouldn't mean anything, but it did. By all the gods, it meant too much.

She slid off her stool and left her lab to go call Yolanda.

* * *

 **AN:** Love you all. Thank you for all the wonderful, wonderful reviews. I read each and everyone. I'm so sorry that it's not possible for me to reply to them all. This really is a drop and dash operation, and it's my hope you want the rest of the story more than you want my babbling adoration that you took the time to let me know you enjoyed my scribblings.


	5. Without Obsession, Life is nothing

**AN:** This story was supposed to be 7 chapters. However, my last chapter is... swelling. It might be eight if I can find a decent place to hack it in half.

* * *

Hermione landed badly and fell onto her back, sending her small suitcase flying over her head. She stared up at the sky, trying to catch her breath, and snorted. Sitting up, she looked around and found Bert Fiendsmith ten feet away lying in a similar state, only his suitcase had sprung open and his clothes, books and papers were festooned about the French countryside.

"Bloody Portkey!" he snapped. He rolled onto his knees and started snatching up his things and shoving them back into the case.

"It did seem that that one was more than a bit off," she said. "Are we sure we're even in France?"

Just then there was a mild squeal and a diminutive, Filipino witch popped out of thin air and landed hard. Trudy Pampanga tried to catch herself, but only managed to take about a dozen steps at a dead run before doing a faceplant.

"Hello, Trudy. Good of you to make it," Bert called with a laugh. "We'd better get out of the landing zone," he said to Hermione.

She nodded and grabbed her suitcase. Once she was standing, she could see the pavilion tents. She pointed, and when Trudy was on her feet and Burt's items had been collected, they set off.

"What's first on the agenda?" Trudy asked as she rubbed her jaw.

"A chiropractor," Bert replied, twisting his chest from right to left.

Hermione smirked at him. "First up is the seminar on The Properties of Avian Interstitial Fluid in Tracking Viral Deviation."

"Oh, good lord," Bert replied. "Is that Davis, Davis, and Hambleton again? Those plonkers must drink that damned bird juice. To listen to them it would cure all the world's ills. I'll skip it. They make me want to hit something, and I'm supposed to be watching my blood pressure."

"Careful," Trudy said with a laugh. "They'll tell you it will cure hypertension as well. What else?"

"Targeting Cytotoxic t-cells," Hermione answered. "I want to go to that one."

Bert nodded. "That one's right up your alley. You should go. In fact, is there anything else good conflicting? I think we all might catch that one."

"Palliative Therapies for Gout."

Bert grunted. "I'll take that one, then. That's a good one, too. Anything else?"

"Not at the same time. At ten there's a lecture on The Imperious Curse's Involvement in Cases of Monophasia, and Effective Potion Therapies."

Trudy nodded. "I'll take that one."

They crested the hilltop and saw the view down the slope to the city of Rouen. It was majestic.

Hermione smiled sadly. She wished Lee had come; he'd have liked this. However, things had been difficult between them lately, and they'd decided that he would only grow bored and restive while she attended the conference, and that would only increase their chance of getting into another argument.

She sighed and headed after the others to find the tent that held the accommodations for the St. Mungo's potioners.

* * *

Hermione popped open her eyes and looked around in sudden fear. When the loud snore came again, she took a deep breath and relaxed. It hadn't been her. She rubbed at her eyes and did her level best to try and pay attention.

It was the third day of the conference and the eager excitement she always brought to these things had faded predictably. This particular lecture had looked fascinating in the program, but Madam Vindenberg seemed to have the innate ability to suck all the interest out of the topic and leave only the dry husk of recited statistics for her audience to chew on.

She shook her head. She'd have to get the published version of this lecture. She wasn't going to remember a thing if she kept falling asleep.

She slipped off her chair and duck-walked down the row to the aisle, trying to avoid stepping on people's toes, and then darted towards the exit. A dark shape to her left made her turn, and she stopped in her tracks at the sight of Severus Snape also trying to escape the lecture. He saw her a moment later, and his eyes widened in surprise. As he drew close, he prodded her elbow and urged her through the tent flap.

"My apologies," he said, once they were through. "I didn't want to hold a reunion in the doorway where everyone could see us. How are you, Miss- _Mrs._ Jordan?"

She smiled and stepped out of the way of another escapee. "Won't you call me Hermione? I'm fine. How are you? You look… well, _amazing_ compared to the last time I saw you."

And he did. He'd gained his weight back and perhaps a bit more. He looked healthy, although he was still pale. Even his hair looked shiny, as opposed to just greasy. It was still lank, but what can be done with hair like that? He was dressed in his usual style—black, with a side of extra buttons—but his clothes looked neat and well-tailored.

She realized she was staring and felt herself blush. "I'm sorry. You just look really good."

He gave her a strained smile. "I have an hour before the next seminar I was looking to attend, would you like to get some coffee?" He asked it casually, but she caught the nervous way he opened and closed his hands.

"I would enjoy that," she said.

He gestured to the dinning pavilion and they set off.

"What lecture are you going to next?" she asked.

"Scorche's"

"Ah. My colleague called dibs on that one. I'm attending Lumet's."

"Lumet's still a complete fool and all your intellectual adoration won't change that."

She laughed. They had differed on Lumet's work when she'd been his apprentice. Usually at the top of their lungs. "Someday I might just come to agree, but it won't be today," she said with a smile.

He darted a look at her, and his eyes crinkled the slightest bit. "Then there's hope for you yet."

She laughed again and followed him to an empty table. He held a chair out for her, and when she was seated, waved imperiously for a server and gave their order.

"So how have you been?" she asked. "I can tell some good things have been happening, you're positively glowing with health."

He smirked. "How do you know it's not a glamour?"

She froze, and her heart gave a painful thump. "Is it?" she blurted, leaning forward.

His eyes widened. "No! _No._ That was a poor attempt at humor. I'm sorry." He grimaced and clenched his hands into fists. "It seems that the last few conversations between us have consisted of various ways for me to say I'm sorry."

She winced. "Perhaps that's just what we get for spending two years finding various ways to say 'shut your gob.'"

He snorted and gave her a wry nod, and she felt like they had only just managed to avert a disaster they hadn't seen coming.

They remained quiet as their coffee arrived with a plate of flaky pastries.

"Where are you working?" she asked.

"I'm still with Bigby," he replied. "Andrew Stern was fired, so I took his job."

She nodded, understanding. "Are you still just a brewer?"

His head snapped up, and she realized it had sounded like a judgment. She shook her head and held up her hands, but he made a calming gesture. "Brewing is all I can handle right now. I need to keep my life simple and not make too many decisions. Coming here is just a… test of sorts… to see if I'm even interested in picking up where I left off."

She nodded. "That sounds like a very wise plan. It's easy to grab more than we can handle and then get crushed under the weight of it."

He gave her a small smile, and his eyes held a glint of relief. He bobbed his head several times. "Exactly."

"What lectures have you been to so far?" she asked.

He sat back and smirked, and they began to discuss every one they'd heard over the last three days and quietly debate their assessments.

He lifted his hands finally and said, "I'm done. You're deluded and there's nothing to be done about it, and I need to go if I'm going to make the next lecture."

She gave him a broad smile. "This was rather fun, wasn't it?"

He smirked. "I would concur that it was something vaguely in the area of amusing."

She stood up, and he followed. "Are you going to Sollievo's lecture in the morning?"

He shook his head. "I leave tonight."

Her smile fell. "Oh."

"I only had the three days off," he explained.

"I see." She struggled to keep her disappointment off her face and stuck out her hand. "It was good to see you again. Whatever you're doing, keep doing it. I hope to see you at the next conference in six months."

"Perhaps. It was… a pleasure," he said, shaking her hand with awkward formality.

Without further ado, he turned and walked away. Hermione watched him until there wasn't a speck of black to be seen.

* * *

Snape walked into the room stiffly and sat in the hard-backed chair. He placed his hands on his thighs, just so, took a deep breath and held it for three heartbeats, as usual, and then slowly blew it out.

"How was the conference?" Dr. Peeples asked with a warm smile.

"I saw her," he blurted.

There was a pause, and Dr. Peeples nodded slowly in understanding. "You knew that would probably happen. How do you feel about seeing her again? It's been almost nine months."

Snape swallowed convulsively and closed his eyes. "It was terrible," he whispered.

"Why?"

His eyes snapped open, and he glared at her. "You bloody well _know_ why! What the fuck have I been sitting here wasting my time for if you're going to play stupid when I need you?"

She sighed, and her warm eyes filled with a sadness that made him feel like a bastard. "Severus. You know you can't talk to me that way. You also know that I need you to tell me _clearly_. It would do you no good if I were to make assumptions. You need to say it, so you can own it, and we can deal with it. Now I'm going to ask you again. Why was it so terrible to see Hermione again?"

He struggled with his wild and hurt-filled anger and finally blurted, "Because I still fucking love her!" He sagged back, defeated. "She's so fucking perfect," he said quietly. "I thought I was stronger."

* * *

"It's not love. It's obsession. You admitted as much months ago."

"Sod off."

"Severus…"

"…"

* * *

"But she _is_ worthy! She forgave me, didn't she? Lily never forgave me, damn it, and what I did to Hermione was far more vile by several orders of magnitude!"

There was a silence for a moment.

"Lily didn't call you a supercilious piker, amongst other, more unsavory things for two solid years. Severus, you and Hermione couldn't stand to be in the same room with each other before the incident, and now, based on an emotionally violent act in which you were both horrendously victimized, you love her. That isn't even remotely healthy."

"She. Fucking. _Forgave_ _me!_ "

"Severus, if you are going to speak in a threatening way, you will have to leave."

" _No!_ I'm sorry. I… didn't mean it."

* * *

"There's no wiggle room here, Severus. You simply can't."

"It's not addictive. I made sure of it."

"Physical addiction has nothing to do with it. You're compulsive by nature. You're intelligent enough to know that you use it to hide from your pain. Wouldn't it be better to be free of the pain altogether? That will never happen while you're using."

He stared out the window for a long moment before he replied, "Fine."

* * *

"I'd like to try something. Do you have access to a pensieve?"

He reared back in his chair as if he was going to climb over the back of it and escape. "If you think I'm going to go back and watch while I rape her, you can go—"

" _No_. I want you to go back and look at the time you two spent working together. I want you to revisit the dynamic that existed before that night. Do you think you could?"

Severus scrunched his eyes closed and sighed. The sounds of traffic dragged on before he quietly whispered, "Alright."

* * *

"You haven't mentioned Hermione yet today. Tell me, did you look at any of your memories?"

"I did."

"And?"

"Can't we talk about something else? We're always banging on about Granger. Personally, it's getting tedious."

Dr. Peeple's nodded, and he relaxed when he saw the lack of censure in her eyes. "What would you like to talk about instead?"

He waved a hand. "You pick the topic."

"Alright." She paused, and his gut clenched with foreboding. Why had he said that? "Let's talk about Lily Evans," she said in a gentle tone.

He flinched as if from a blow.

* * *

"You're making remarkable progress, you know."

"Am I? It doesn't feel like it."

"That's because there's a lot on your plate. However, I think you are. When was the last time you got high?"

"Three months ago."

She smiled broadly. "That's wonderful."

He gave her a small smile, pleased with himself, and then changed the topic to what he really wanted to tell her. "I went to the cemetery yesterday."

"Where Lily is buried?"

"No. I went to see my parents."

"Oh, Severus. That was a big step. I'm very proud of you."

He swallowed and stared at the window shade, bobbing his head once in acknowledgment.

"Tell me what you're feeling."

He sighed flexing the fingers on his thighs. "Small. I feel curiously small."

* * *

"Isn't there a Potioners' Conference coming up soon?"

"November."

"Last month? You didn't mention it. Why?"

"Because I knew she'd be there, and I… I didn't want to see her. I've come to understand that the dynamic between us is innately unhealthy. Until I get through my issues, it's best that I don't bog things down with extraneous emotional feedback. Don't you think?"

"I agree completely. That was a very mature decision. I'm just curious as to why you never mentioned it."

"Perhaps I'm getting to the point where I don't need so much bloody hand-holding."

Dr. Peeples gave him a long look and then her brown eyes turned sad. "Severus, when was the last time you got high?"

He grimaced and contracted his hands into fists, scrunching his shoulders up to his ears. "November."

She let out a long, sad sigh.

* * *

"I had lunch with Minerva yesterday."

"How did it go?"

"Well. We have plans to go to the symphony in two weeks."

"That sounds marvelous. Reconnecting can be a scary thing. How are you feeling?"

"Silly. I feel silly. This," he waved his hand about the room as if it contained all of his problems, "all just feels so very silly. I'm tired of it all. I don't want this anymore. I don't want to be angry, or depressed, or obsessional… I just," He wrapped his arms around his middle and leaned forward. "I just don't want to be alone anymore. I'm so very tired of being alone."

"And you're making good progress towards dealing with that. Reestablishing your friendships will help. In time, you'll be secure enough to find a way to connect with someone on a more intimate level. It will be slow, but it _will_ happen."

He snorted and rolled his eyes. "I don't suppose you could arrange for it to happen sooner, rather than later? Before I wank my tadger off?"

She laughed, and he smirked, feeling curiously lighter.

* * *

"I've come to realize she was nothing more or less than just a bright and caring person with a hidden streak of callousness, and had I not been so damnably lonely, I wouldn't have recreated her into the false image I needed her to wear."

"And how do you feel about that?"

"Empty. But in a good way. Like I've tapped the last of it and it's done."

Dr. Peeples smiled warmly. "I'm very proud of you. That is a hell of an accomplishment."

"Thank you."

"Lily has been a torment for a very long time. How do you think you will handle being free of her?"

"I'm not sure, really."

"Do you feel any urge to self-medicate?"

He inhaled and let it go slowly. "No. I haven't in a long while."

"Will you call me if you feel tempted?"

He grimaced, feeling like a little boy, but nodded.

* * *

"An interesting thing happened to me yesterday."

"Tell me."

"Skyler blew up at me at work over something that wasn't my fault."

"How did you react?"

He shook his head. "I didn't. I didn't feel defensive, I didn't want to rip his head off his neck, I just… I knew it wasn't my problem and that he was simply being an idiot. I wasn't _angry_. Just annoyed."

"That's very good. How did you feel afterwards?"

He thought about it for a moment and then looked back at her. "Smug."

* * *

"You haven't said whether or not you would go to Tuscany for the conference in April."

"I'm not going."

"I see. Can you tell me why?"

"You know why."

"Severus…"

He heaved a sigh. "Right. Fine. It's because _she_ will be there. There will only be about 400 people in attendance. I'm sure to run into her again."

"Alright. That's a very valid reason. But I thought you had said you'd come to terms with your feelings for her. You said that you felt you could keep things in perspective now despite your lingering attachment. What changed?"

Severus scowled at her. "She's wasn't _divorced_ before," he snapped. "She's free now, isn't she? It was in all the papers! It's too…" scrunching up his face, he shook his head, "tempting." His arms wrapped around his middle. "I'd make a fool of myself," he said, rocking slightly. "I just need to stay away from her."

"I think that's a very wise choice."

* * *

"Severus?"

He spun around. "Hermione? What the devil are you doing here?"

She raised her eyebrows. "It would appear I was here purchasing books." She pointed at the stack in his hand. "Should I ask what you're doing? Or can I leap to a conclusion?"

He winced at this echo of an old argument but saw the glimmer of humor in her eye. "I think you could make a valid presumption, but until I actually purchase the books it doesn't preclude the possibility that I might have only wanted to stand in the queue _holding_ books. This is England, after all. Queues are a national pastime."

She laughed, and the sound went straight to his chest and squeezed. "I see I shall have to stand behind you and monitor your behavior in order to make a more complete analysis of the situation." With a delightful giggle, she dismissed their play. "How _are_ you?"

He hugged his purchases close to his chest to hide the beating of his heart. "I'm well. And you?"

A tightening around her eyes presaged her wan smile. "I'm doing well enough."

"I read about your… marital difficulties. You have my sympathy. Something like that must be challenging enough without it being an item of interest in the paper."

"Thank you. It wasn't fun on several fronts, I will admit that."

" _Next!"_

He turned and scowled at the witch behind the register, shoving his books at her and turning back. "I thought you would be in Tuscany attending the conference."

She grimaced and flapped a dismissive hand. "I took a pass this time. I let one of the newer people go instead. I didn't see you in Stockholm last autumn. Were you there?"

He paid for his books and stepped back as she placed hers on the counter. "No. I didn't bother."

She nodded. "And you skipped Tuscany as well. Does this mean you've decided to keep things small?"

He waited until she'd finished paying and they'd both turned away from the counter. "For now. I have enough on my plate at the moment." He held the door for her and followed her through. "I read your paper on thistle seed oil. It was interesting."

She laughed. "It wasn't my paper. My name was one of six attached to it. I really only confirmed the initial findings. I thought that paper rather dull to be honest and wish my colleague hadn't been so generous with her attributions."

He grimaced. "Actually, I thought the paper was insipid but I was trying not to offend. Which way are you going?"

She gestured in the same direction he needed, and he stepped off up the pavement. "What sort of research are you doing now?" he asked as she fell into step next to him.

"Cytotoxic t-cells. I'm working with Asquith in Brussels. Mostly we meet about once a month and argue with each other."

"Asquith makes up for his lack of intuition by thinking he's a genius."

"I agree wholeheartedly. He resents the progress I've made without him, and it's disrupting the work. I want to cut him loose but the original breakthrough was his and it would be bad form."

He snorted. "I always detested the politics of ego."

She laughed. "Sadly, that seems to be about sixty percent of our field."

"It comprised about ninety percent of the Death Eaters," he drawled, earning a surprised look. He'd become so used to saying anything with Dr. Peeples that he only just realized he'd never brought _that_ subject up with _anyone_ before.

She stopped beside a bright red door. "This is me now. I just moved in last week."

He felt a burst of anguish that their walk was over. "I live just up the way," he said inanely. The look of relief on her face stabbed him with the memory that she'd seen where he'd lived before. "May I ask why you decided not to go to Tuscany?" he asked, in an attempt to draw out the moment.

She wrinkled her nose. "My honeymoon was in Tuscany. Going back there so soon after the divorce seemed too much like pouring salt on the wound."

"Ah. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have pried."

"It's fine. Each day is a step in the right direction, right?"

He nodded at one of the more familiar phrases from his therapy sessions. "Do you still see Dr. Peeples?"

Her eyes widened in surprise but then she shook her head. "I saw her a few times after I found you. I needed a little gluing back together. And I spoke to her on the phone a few times during the divorce, but that's all. Did… did you ever look her up?"

He nodded. "It took a few months, but I did eventually. I still see her once a week."

She gave him a dazzling smile that nearly seized his heart. "I'm glad. She saved me." Tilting her head to the side, she asked, "Have you plans for dinner? Perhaps we could grab a bite."

He blinked several times, his need to say yes nearly choking him. "I–I can't. I'm sorry. I have things to do…"

Her smile grew wistful. "Ah, well. Another time perhaps. It was lovely seeing you again."

He backed away, struggling to find his voice. "You as well," he rasped. He turned and walked on, forcing himself to a leisurely pace.

* * *

Hermione was late for work. She'd had the most wonderful dream, and when her alarm had gone off, she'd slapped it into submission and dove back under her eyelids. Now she was running behind and wouldn't have time to stop at the bakery two doors down and grab her usual croissant.

She thumped down the stairs from her flat and whipped open the door. A dark sleeve blocked her way, holding a bag from the bakery that smelled divine.

"Severus!" She couldn't help the enormous grin on her face. She'd been hoping to see him again since they'd run into each other at the bookshop a month ago. Now that she had, she was almost ridiculously pleased. "What are you doing here?"

"I thought that would be obvious. I'm stalking you." He pushed off the building where he'd been leaning and started walking. "You're late."

"I know!" She grabbed the bag and opened it. "How did you know I'm late?" She broke off a piece of flaky croissant and stuffed it into her mouth before offing him a piece. "And how did you know I love croissants?

He shook his head and replied, "Because I've been watching you. Hence the term 'stalking' and not 'being neighborly.'"

They set off up the road towards the Leaky where she usually Floo'd to work. "Yes, but stalking doesn't quite carry that desirable sense of 'friendly'. Actually, it usually falls into the category of 'disturbing.' How long have you been stalking me?"

"I just started a few days ago. That's when I noticed we leave for work about the same time each day. All I've managed to discern so far is what you eat for breakfast and when."

"So you're just a morning stalker."

"Pretty much. The times I leave work are unpredictable. I've yet to see you on the way home."

"I see." She stuffed another bite into her mouth. "You're not, you know, peeking in my window and all the rest, are you?"

He shook his head. "Too tawdry and far too much effort."

"Well, that's almost reassuring."

He stopped outside of the apothecary. "This is me," he said, his face a stony mask once more. "Have a good day."

"You as well, and thank you for the croissant."

He nodded and pushed open the door, disappearing inside.

She grinned and shook her head in happy confusion as she turned away, shoving the last bite into her mouth.


	6. Soaring on Waxen Wings

**AN:** Onward to glory! Or, well, closer to the happy ending!

* * *

"Severus…"

"What?" He sat with his arms folded across his chest, one leg crossed over the other, and a toe bouncing up and down.

"Need I say it?"

"You're the one that's always rattling on about how we mustn't assume we're communicating."

Dr. Peeples sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Severus, this isn't healthy…"

"Why not? I'm just walking to work with her every day. It's harmless. We just talk about her research, the weather, and the imbeciles that we work with. I haven't said anything snide, nor has she showed the slightest hint that she minds my company. In _fact_ , she's started bringing along tea for both of us."

Dr. Peeples opened her mouth, but he held his hand up. "I'm just being _friendly_. You said I needed to work on that. I'm not going to do anything stupid like ask her out for dinner."

"Then what _are_ you doing?"

He raised one eyebrow and replied, "Obviously, I'm waiting for _her_ to do something stupid. She asked me once, she might again."

Dr. Peeples threw her hands up. "And what if she never does?"

He shrugged nonchalantly. "Then she doesn't."

"And what if she just happens to find someone _else_ to go out to dinner with?"

He squirmed. "Then I'll hope she's happy."

"And will you then spend the rest of your days hating _him_ the way you hated James Potter?"

"Oh, please. Do you even know me? Of course I will."

Dr. Peeples growled. "Stop being so flippant! You could get _hurt_. You could lose all the wonderful progress that you've made, and I'm very concerned that you aren't even showing the slightest bit of self-protective behavior."

He sighed. "You're saying that if I continue, I risk ending up emotionally devastated and alone."

" _Yes!_ "

"What makes that any different from any other day? And besides, the nature of gambling with one's fate implies that despite the odds, one might _win_." He sat forward suddenly. "Dr. Peeples, I've spent most of my life playing with my little chemistry set so I could recreate the emotions that others take for granted. Don't you think it's time I felt what it was like to actually _be_ happy?"

She grimaced and shook her head. "Of course. Absolutely. But Severus, we still have a lot of work to do. You've admitted you've been avoiding deeper issues, and getting you ready to face them is my job. This is counterproductive and potentially harmful. You're still fragile and Hermione—"

"Is strong," he finished. "And beautiful, and bright, and brilliant, and I know that I've obsessed in the past, but I also think that what I feel for her is _real_. I know I have other… _things_ I need to work on, but wouldn't it help if I wasn't so… miserable? She makes me _happy_. It's such an insipid-sounding word, but there it is. I'm happy when I'm with her, even if it's just ten minutes in the morning. I'm sorry, Yolanda. I need to try. I promise I won't do anything foolish."

She closed her eyes and sighed heavily. "Please, be careful. This is so dangerous…"

"I shall. I promise."

* * *

Severus left the apothecary and heard the lock click behind him. He took a deep breath of the autumn air and blew it out, turning his collar up against the slight chill. He closed his eyes for a moment before opening them and looking about. With a sigh, he stepped off up the pavement towards home.

There was a giggle and then suddenly Hermione was there, melting into view from the head down as her Charm wore off. "Did I get you?" she asked, her eyes alight with humor and excitement.

"Yes," he said. "My congratulations, that's hard to do. And somewhat dangerous to do to an ex-Death Eater, I might add."

She scrunched up her face. "Oh, I hadn't thought of that. I guess it was stupid."

"Well, as long as you lead off with a giggle, you should be safe. Where you waiting there for long? It's almost seven o'clock."

"No, I'm just coming home myself. I saw you ahead of me and decided to stalk you for a change. I put a Silencing Charm on my shoes and ran. I'm afraid I'm rusty at skulking. Without Harry's cloak I was always pants at it anyway. How was your day?"

"Vastly rewarding. I made ten gallons of Blemish Cream. I can rest now, knowing I've saved countless teenagers from the horror of spots. And you?"

"It was actually a bit boring until I received a letter from Asquith telling me he was resigning from the project. He apparently can't stand the idea of putting his name to my work when he knows I'm doomed to failure. After I read that, it was hard to stop smiling. In fact, want to help me celebrate? We could grab a bite to eat at La Sorcière Ivre."

His step faltered, and he turned to her and stopped. She'd done it. She'd asked him out again. "Are you sure?"

His voice must have given away his panic, because her face grew serious as she turned toward him. When she placed a hand on his arm, it was all he could do not to start trembling. "I'm very sure," she said. "I'd like to think we've moved past all of our histories. Not just that night, but those dreadful two years, and even the war and my schooling." He blinked rapidly as she sucked in a deep breath and let it out. "I'd like to be friends, Severus, not just acquaintances. And friends have dinner together on a Friday night."

 _Friends._ The word clanged around in his brain, swollen with all its ambiguous connotations. "Dinner sounds lovely," he said, barely hearing himself above the noise in his head.

She smiled at him, achingly beautiful. "Right, then," she said, obviously pleased. "I'll just pop up to the flat and get changed. I'll meet you back out here in, say, thirty minutes?"

He nodded and backed away. "Until then," he replied with a small bow. When she closed the red door behind her, he turned and fled.

* * *

Hermione dashed up to her flat, and as soon as she'd closed the door, she slumped against it. "You're being a fool, woman," she snapped at herself. She couldn't keep it up. Instead, she grinned and let out a small squeal. She dashed into her bedroom and began stripping off her robes. She only had thirty minutes to figure out what to wear to dinner that wouldn't shout, 'trying too hard.'

It had been a month since they'd begun their little morning routine of walking to work together. In that time they'd talked of anything and everything but their past. She'd come to know a side of him that she'd never been privy to before, namely, he was dead funny when he wanted to be. Granted, it was a droll, dry humor, and invariably at someone else's expense, but never hers. He was unfailingly polite and kind to her.

In fact, he was a bit _too_ polite. It was very hard to gauge if her peaking interest was mutual or not. All she had to go on was the fact that in the beginning, he'd claimed he'd been stalking her. It was an admittedly perverse fact to base anything on.

Their shared past was always between them, like a pestilential ogre they were both trying to ignore, and she was desperate to go as slow as possible. However, it had obviously been what he was referring to—her mind replayed all the emotions that had played out on his face when he'd said, 'Are you sure?'—and she'd gone ahead and brought it out into the open.

Now she just needed to figure out if it was best to let it lie a bit, or perhaps if tonight wouldn't be a good time to finally discuss it again. She'd already said what she'd needed to, back when they'd spoken in the hospital, but perhaps he had things he needed to say.

She settled on a fine set of brown robes. They were plain but elegant.

She finished dressing and turned toward the mirror, inspecting herself. She grimaced, wondering how she would react if what he needed to say was that they could only be casual friends at best.

Somehow, she felt it was important that she not let him know she was sure she'd already lost her heart.

:

Hermione stood on the pavement and cast another warming charm on herself. Chaffing her hands together, she again thought about walking up the street and trying to find his flat. Could he have thought she wanted to meet at the restaurant? She replayed the conversation in her head. No. She'd been clear that she would meet him right here. What could have happened? Could he have fallen ill? Was he hurt? Surely, if he couldn't make it after all, he would have sent word…

An hour later, she slipped back inside her flat. Her lip was clamped firmly between her teeth to keep it from wobbling, but she couldn't stop the burning tears of disappointment.

* * *

Severus violently rocked back and forth in the chair with his hands pressed tight against his stomach as he moaned. "She's still there! I know she is!"

"Tell me again why you didn't send her a note," Dr. Peeples said.

"I couldn't! I tried, but I couldn't write the fucking words!"

"Tell me why? What was going through your head?"

He grimaced around a fresh wave of pain. "I couldn't write it because I didn't mean it, don't you see? I _want_ to be there. I want to be anywhere she wants me to be! But she just wants to be fucking _friends!_ I couldn't—I can't… I'm not strong enough. It's too much. It's all too much."

"What's all too much?"

"The temptations!" he shouted. "Having her so close, and yet… _not_. Having all those ingredients around me all the time…" He stabbed a look up at her, realizing he'd betrayed himself.

"Did you—?"

"No," he said, shaking his head violently as he dug his mobile out of his pocket. He brandished the Muggle phone in his fist like a talisman. "I called you instead, didn't I?"

"I'm very glad you did, Severus. I know it hurts, but you took steps to protect yourself and your hard-won peace. I'm very proud of you, and I'm very glad you're here."

He scrunched up his face, unable to feel her pride. All he could feel was the ragged hole in his chest. "She's still waiting," he moaned. "I just know it! She's going to hate me all over again…" That last thought shredded his final defenses. Horrified, he tried to stifle the wail that was trying to break free, but it was too late. All he could do when the sobbing started was surrender to it in shame. His phone clattered to the floor as he grabbed for the box of tissues beside his chair.

* * *

The following Monday, Hermione was determined to put the incident behind them so as to not upset the delicate friendship they had managed to establish. She'd spent the weekend kicking herself for pushing. That had to be the problem. He was just trying to be friendly, and her wanting more had thrown him for a loop. She hissed at herself in anger again. It was an incoherent noise, but full of everything she needed to say.

The idea of anything between them was ludicrous, given their past. Why had she thought more was possible? Why didn't it occur to her that he might have been repulsed by the idea of being in any way more intimate with her? He'd tried to make peace between them, and she'd barged over the line. Just as she had barged over his boundaries when she'd been his apprentice.

She prepared two cups of tea as usual and headed down the stairs only to find herself alone on the busy street. She waited as long as she could, but then set off up the street, dumping both cups in the gutter and shrinking them down to stuff in her bag.

By Friday, she was angry.

She took a long lunch and Flooed back to Diagon Alley, stomping up the street in a huff. A chiming bell rang out as she shoved open the door to the apothecary.

"Hello! How can I help you today? Oh! Mrs. Jordan! What a delightful surprise! How may I be of service?"

She gave Mr. Bigby a tight smile. "Actually, I was hoping I could have a word with Mr. Snape, if he's available. I won't be but a moment, I assure you."

Bigby's face contorted in confusion and concern. "He's not in any trouble, is he?"

She blanched and shook her head quickly. "No! No, no. Nothing of the sort. I just haven't seen him in a little while and wanted to speak with him."

Little hairs began to lift when she saw he wasn't any less concerned. "I'm sorry, but… Severus doesn't work here anymore. He put in his notice last weekend—said he'd had a job offer and needed to make a swift decision."

Hermione swallowed as her guts began to churn. "Do you know where?"

Bigby shook his head. "He didn't say. I wish him luck, though. He always was too good for this job. He said he was moving as well, but I've no idea where to." He noticed her crestfallen look and smiled reassuringly. "I'm sure he's fine. He seemed fine when we spoke."

She nodded and turned away.

* * *

"Yolanda? It's Hermione. Listen, I was wondering if you could tell me if Severus is alright. You see, he was— No, I understand. Yes, of course, but—I _know_ that, I'm not completely stupid. I'm not asking for—Look, just tell me if he's still alive, God damn it! Oh. Yes, of course. I wasn't thinking. That's all I wanted to know anyway. I was just concerned, is all. I'm sorry. I won't bother you again."

Hermione folded her mobile closed and stared at it in anger. It had been a long time since someone had managed to make her feel like an errant child. " _Breech of doctor-patient confidentiality_ ," she mimicked petulantly. "Sod off."

At least she knew he was alive.

* * *

She sat at her kitchen table alone, picking at her cold meat pie with her fork. She was far more fascinated by the fact that one of the tines on the fork was bent slightly than the pie itself. She dropped the fork in disgust and pushed her plate away.

She was about to clear the table when she heard a scrabbling at the window. She dug an owl treat out of the bowl and opened the window, swapping the treat for the roll of parchment. "There you go. Fly carefully."

 _Fly carefully? What the hell was that?_ She shook her head. Perhaps it was time to get another cat.

She grabbed her wineglass and headed into her sitting room to read her post. When she saw the spiky script, she froze. Years of derogatory notations had burned that penmanship into her psyche.

The wine sloshed onto her hand as she nearly dropped the glass onto her end table, and she swiped it absentmindedly on her robes before popping the wax.

She sucked in a deep breath and unrolled it.

' _Hermione,_

' _Please accept my deepest and most sincere apologies for the concern I have caused you. It seems I am destined to eternally ask for forgiveness from you. I can tell you, from reading between the lines, that Yolanda was more than a little unhappy to have been caught between us, and made no bones about the need for me to come clean and explain myself and my actions to you. From this, I have surmised that I have hurt you again. I am terribly sorry. It grieves me._

' _I should have sent word to cancel our dinner last week. However, I was in no fit shape to do so at the time. Further explanation is owed, and yet I am loath to explain, since it will paint me in such a pathetic light._

' _Suffice it to say that I have issues. This should come as little shock to you, I know. As my one and only apprentice, you more than anyone are aware that I lack certain social graces and have more than a few difficulties when it comes to the interpersonal mechanisms that come so easily to others._

' _What I need to tell you is that my disappearance is in no way your fault. You see, I have become more than a little obsessed with you. In fact, the truth is, I really_ _was_ _stalking you at first. The fact that we managed, if for only a little while, to craft a pleasant and significant acquaintance in the last few weeks means more to me than I can express in mere words. However, I have always wanted more. It wasn't until your innocent offer of a true friendship that I fully understood the danger._

' _I cannot be friends with you. The intensity of my feelings for you is a dazzling distraction from the deeper issues in my life. As difficult as it may be to imagine, considering the horror of what happened between us, you are, in fact, the lesser of my sins. You were only the one that finally broke me._

' _I will not be whole until I work on these other demons, and as long as I can distract myself with thoughts of you, I never will._

' _It is not fair to you to continue in a friendship under false pretenses, and I have only just come to realize that it is not fair to me, either. You are so strong. I am awed by how well you have come through the fire. I feel as if my unwelcome attachment to you sullies your spirit somehow, and I have no desire to taint you any more than I already have done._

' _I wish you luck in all of your endeavors. I wish you safe from all harm, and I wish I hadn't caused you such distress. I am very sorry._

' _May this be the last time I ever have to express that thought to you,_

' _Severus'_

She finished the letter and pressed it against her heart. Her lower lip began to quiver slightly, and then her face crumpled as her eyes filled with tears. "Oh, Severus…"

She woke the next morning, curled up into a ball on her sofa, still clutching his letter. She pushed herself up and looked around her flat, shoving her matted hair off her face and sighing. Putting the letter into a box under her bed, she then showered, dressed, and set out to find herself a cat. Or two...

* * *

Severus walked into the room lost in thought and sat in the comfortable chair. He placed his hands on his thighs, just so, took a deep breath and held it for three heartbeats, as usual, and then slowly blew it out.

"What would you like to tackle first today?" Yolanda asked.

His fingertips turned white from the force he used to press them into his thighs. "V–Voldemort," he whispered. "I want to tell you about the things I've done…"

She breathed out a long, deep sigh and smiled at him proudly. "All right. Let's talk about that."

He straightened, feeling curiously numb, and began. His words came out in a flat, lifeless monotone. "When I was sixteen, I attended a reception as a guest of Lucious Malfoy…"

* * *

:

"Granger, why haven't you signed off on Bucharest?"

"Hmm?" She looked up to see Bert staring down at her in annoyance.

"I'm trying to get all the departmental ducks in a row for the conference in Bucharest and you haven't signed off on any of the paperwork. It's not like you can get out of this one, you're presenting your paper."

Hermione sighed. "I'm sorry. I just can't muster any enthusiasm."

"Can't muster—You're about to take Asquith's own research and shove it up his arse sideways, and you can't muster any enthusiasm? Hermione, what's wrong with you?"

"You know I hate these things."

He sat down on her desk, shoving her latest thesis research out of the way. "No, actually, I remember you used to love these things. In fact, you used to dream of getting up there and making waves." He sighed and chucked her under the chin with a knuckle. "You haven't been to a conference since your divorce. That was eighteen months ago. Don't you think it's time to move on? Lee did."

She sighed. It really wasn't as if she'd been hiding from life. She was a busy woman, what with her research and statistical analysis and experimentation and... and cats. She _had_ gone on a few dates, but was it her fault that she'd only managed to attract desperate little mummy's boys? No, it was not. In the end, it had been far more rewarding to bury herself in her research and cat fur. She looked up and saw the pity and concern in Bert's eyes. Okay, perhaps she _had_ lost a little of her zest for life, but was that so unusual considering? She _was_ closing in on thirty, after all. Wasn't a woman entitled to a good sulk at her age? As for the conference, she really didn't relish the idea of putting herself up on a block to be judged. Once that would have been a challenge to rise to. Now? It smacked of judgement, and Hermione loathed the idea of being judged and found wanting.

Bert's eyes took on a pleading cast, and she huffed. "Who's going to take care of my cats?"

Sensing his victory, he smirked and stood up. "My wife loves cats and I don't. She'd be ecstatic to watch your cats while we're gone." He dropped a program on her desk. "Here. I expect you to memorize the schedule for old time's sake." Another stack of parchment landed on top of it. "And sign all that will you?"

She snorted, and he clapped her on the shoulder before heading back out of her lab.

She made short work of filling out the forms and then had one of her assistants run the papers back to her supervisor. Kicking back in her chair, she thumbed through the pages of the program, skimming the itinerary until she found her lecture, _The Use of Distilled Murtlap in Cytotoxic Potions, and Their Efficacy in Eradicating Cellular Damage from Internal Curse Burns_.

She smiled wistfully and stroked her finger across her own name.

She'd made it.

She'd achieved her dream.

Somehow it felt as dry as dust, and her eyes filled with tears. She'd climbed to the top by standing on the shoulders of a broken man and couldn't push past the pain that came whenever she thought about him.

He was so beautiful.

And ugly.

In their brief, barely-a-month long friendship, she'd come to see him as someone wholly new. Not her teacher, nor her mentor. Not the Death Eater, nor the man who mourned Lily. He was just the friend that swapped a croissant for a cup of tea every morning and could be ungodly creative when insulting people. He was gentle and kind and cutting and cruel. He was unbelievably hard, and yet sensitive to the point of brittleness. A glass knife, deadly and fragile. He was infinitely more complicated than she had ever allowed for him to be.

And just when she felt she understood him, just when there was a ghost of a chance that she might finally fuse her images of him to the person he really was, he was gone. Dissipated like smoke. Leaving her with the knowledge that he really did want her, and the wanting hurt him. How does one recover from that? The memory flayed her peace of mind. She knew it wouldn't have cut so deep had she not been so vulnerable after her and Lee fell apart, but even after working through the detritus of a ruined marriage, there had been the puckered scar left by Snape. She sighed and swiped at the traces of tears in her eyes. It had been well over a year now, and yet there were days when it felt like yesterday.

Flipping the program closed, she dropped it onto her desk.

Trudy came in, bringing an extra mug of the swill they called tea down in the St. Mungo's canteen. "I see Bert finally tracked you down" she said. "He's been ranting about not being able to all week."

"I was here the whole time, he didn't look hard."

"Of course he didn't look hard. He was having too much fun ranting. Have you looked at the itinerary?"

"Just a glance. Anything in there that should strike my fancy?"

"Aside from your own lecture? All the greats will be there this time. Sollievo's got a paper on arthritis treatments, and Lumet's co-presenting a paper on restoring brain function after strokes. There's also that paper by your former mentor that's generating a bit of buzz. He's been gone from the field for a long time."

She choked on her tea. "What?"

"Snape. He's done a paper on curse damage. I thought you'd know. You were his apprentice, after all. Don't you two keep in touch?"

Hermione shook her head. "No."

"Huh. I still keep in touch with my mentor and both of my apprentices," Trudy said. "There's a bond there, you know. It seems, I don't know, _wrong_ to break it. Unless he was a real bastard. Bert never had anything good to say about his mentor, Earling, but I know he treats his apprentices like his children."

Hermione gave her a brittle, distracted smile as she thumbed through the program again. "It's complicated," she said vaguely.

She found what she was looking for on page twenty-one: _'The Cumulative Effects of Dark Curses, and the Possibilities for Misdiagnosis in Treatment, by Severus Snape.'_

She felt her heart swell and fill her chest. He'd done it.

She didn't know just how far he'd made it out of his personal darkness yet, but this was a hell of a leap from just a damned brewer. She skimmed the excerpted précis and smiled broadly. There _was_ a bond between an apprentice and their master, but she suspected it wasn't often that it was the apprentice that felt like the proud parent.

She ran her finger across his name and smiled.

* * *

 **AN:** Terribly sorry. I couldn't figure out where to cut chapter seven, so it will be a whopper. My bad.


	7. To Feel the Sun Again from Both Sides

**AN:** Thank you, dear readers, for staying with my angsty little tale. May all your angst be in fanfic.

* * *

Eyes shinning, she stood in the back of the auditorium, listening to the excited chatter of those around her. There were no seats left, but she had no fear of being seen by the man making his way to center stage. Those left standing were five deep to the wall, and she was short. She peeked out between shoulders and could just make out Snape as he approached the lectern.

She saw his eyes widen as the room burst into applause. He looked utterly discomfited by this reception. Everyone there knew why he had disappeared from the potions community in the years during the Second Wizarding War, and it was obvious they felt his return was long overdue. Their applause rolled across him, nearly buffeting his narrow frame. She watched him open and close his hands and recognized it for the fight or flight response that it was. _Oh, lord, this could go tits up. Come on, Severus, you can do it_ , she thought, mentally pushing positivity towards him across the distance between.

She blew out a breath as he raised his hand for silence and grinned like a loon as he cleared his throat and began. His deep, authoritative voice flowed out across the room...

:

Hermione took a deep breath, set her shoulders, lifted her chin, and walked out onto the stage. Her step faltered when she saw the audience, but she caught herself and pasted a determined smile on her face. Setting her notes down on the lectern was a subconscious, mechanical gesture because her mind was absorbed with looking at the faces in the crowd. The small lecture room was nearly empty, and she could plainly see that Snape wasn't there.

 _Probably still trying to answer the questions of his adoring fans_ , she thought with a sniff. She'd tried to get his attention at the end of the lecture, tried to wriggle through the tightly-packed crowd to at least let him know she'd been there, but hadn't been able to get within ten feet of him as the throng swallowed him. She'd backed away to the outskirts, struggling with a wave of fear as her latent agoraphobia flared up. she hoped that standing in a clear space would allow him to see her. her. He hadn't. She'd loitered as long as she could but eventually had needed to go prepare for her own lecture. Standing now in her small conference room, with its handful of people, it was hard not to feel resentful.

Trudy flapped her hand at her from the front row, and Bert looked like he was about to jump up onstage and start reading for her. It wasn't until she spied both Sollievo and Lumet waiting patiently for her to begin that it sank in. Snape wasn't the point. Yes, he'd been the distraction that made her look forward to being here—a dazzling distraction, to use his own phrase—but she was here to present her breakthrough, not to earn one man's approval.

Seizing control of her disorderly thoughts, she imagined a point of numbness on the top of her head and let it trickle down her entire body like a Disillusionment Charm, masking her disappointment.

"Welcome," she said with a tight smile. "Thank you for being here." With a tap of her wand on the projector next to her, the first slide appeared on the screen behind her. "As many of you know, merely surviving a direct hit from a variety of curses is not enough to ensure the health and well-being of the victim. Oftentimes the internal damage is such that the subject…"

:

Hermione gathered her notes and bowed graciously, to the smattering of applause. The Q&A after her lecture had gone on far longer than she'd expected, and she was more than pleased with her paper's reception.

Bert scrambled his bulk up onto the stage and hugged her like a proud papa. "And now we drink!" he enthused. "To celebrate! You did fantastic! Did you see Lumet? He was hanging on your every word! You made waves today, my dear. Just you wait and see!"

Hermione wrinkled her nose. "Did you see Hambleton? He was asleep."

Trudy snorted. "That's because you didn't mention avian interstitial fluid once. It's the only reason he attends anyone's lectures, to see if they're stealing his intellectual property. Now, come on, Bert's right. Yours was the last lecture of the day, and you had Lumet and Sollievo actually talking over each other to ask you questions. This was a major coup. You'll be the talk of the cocktail hour."

"I doubt that," she said petulantly.

"True, your Mr. Snape stole a good bit of everyone's thunder," Bert said, "but it was a rather remarkable presentation. You can't deny him that. It didn't take a genius to see that a good bit of the data was sampled from personal experience. The poor sod." Bert shook his head, but then seemed to shrug off the disturbing images from the slide show. "Still, there's nothing wrong with being second best your first time out. Once the dust settles, you'll find yourself with a frenetic consulting schedule. That alone is reason to celebrate."

Hermione smiled and nodded. "True. All right then, you two go on ahead. I have to grab my things."

With a wave, they headed for the exit as she started pulling her slides from the projector. She turned toward the back of the stage and jumped. Snape was leaning against the wall holding her handbag up in two long fingers.

He looked different somehow. He was still swaddled in black, still long and lean, and his hair was about the same length that she remembered. There were a few strands of silver in it—their wild texture making them standout against the rest of it—and his face was even more etched than before, but there was something else different about him that she couldn't readily identify. His manner was stiff, but not the self-aware, uncomfortable stiff she'd come to see as normal after that terrible night. It was the former, superior stiffness that always managed to get up her nose.

"Hello," she said.

"Hello, to you," he replied in a quiet voice. "You were brilliant, as I always expected."

She frowned and reached out to take her bag, quickly stuffing her things in. "Always? I seem to remember you constantly telling me I was hopelessly foolish." The words came of their own accord and she stared down at the floor, knowing she'd been petty but determined to at least not squirm with shame.

"You never ceased to amaze me with your capacity to be foolish," he replied snidely. "However, there was no escaping the fact that you were gifted. I hardly would have taken you on as an apprentice had that not been the case."

The frosty tone in his voice, along with his supercilious attitude, threw her emotions into turmoil. "Why didn't you ever tell me that?" she said with no small amount of hurt and exasperation. "Why let me think that the only reason you took me on was to pay back the debt you owed Minerva for saving you?"

He scowled at her, his eyes flashing. "The only reason I took on an apprentice _was_ to get Minerva off my back, that much is true, but do you really think I would have taken _you_ on had I found a reason to disqualify you? Do you really think I _wanted_ to saddle myself with one of the bloody Golden Trio for two more years after finally being rid of the lot of you? You _had_ to have been the best candidate. How could you have doubted it?" He scoffed and waved a hand imperiously. "You never did take the time to think things through to their logical conclusion. You were always too busy proving how good you were at regurgitating facts to think for your _self_."

"I was trying to prove myself to you!"

"Why? I had already chosen you! Why on earth would you waste your energy in such a way?"

"Because I _respected_ you!"

"Now you're just lying," he said with a sneer.

"No, I'm not! When have you ever known me to lie?"

"Let's see, there was that one time after being nearly killed by a troll…"

"Don't go there! I was _twelve!_ "

He spun away and dragged a hand through his lank hair. "I'm making a hash of this," he snapped. His face angled back over his shoulder towards her, offering her an unobstructed view of his awful profile. "I just wanted to tell you I was… _proud_. Your work is truly brilliant."

She blew out a breath and reached up and unclasped her own hair from its confines, taking a moment to gather her wild emotions. "Thank you," she said in a soft voice. The acoustics of the room carried it far. "That really does mean a lot." He turned back to her slowly, and she gave him a timid smile. "I had a brilliant teacher."

"So you did," he said with a ghost of a smile. "I shall bask in reflected glory."

She snorted. "Bask in your own glory. How is it you never told me you were _The_ Severus Snape? Based on what I saw when you finished your lecture, you even have groupies."

He scowled. "Perhaps because I didn't _know_ I was _The_ Severus Snape. Most of these people wouldn't have given me the time of day before. My last lecture drew half the people that came to yours and nowhere near the number of notables in the field. I suspect my new-found fame has more to do with being an infamous spy than a potioner."

She sighed. "I'm sorry. I'm just being petty."

He tilted his head to the side. "Why?" he asked.

She scrunched up her nose. "Because I've been waiting for this moment for years, and when it finally arrives, my own mentor stole my thunder." She shrugged, embarrassed. "Like I said, petty."

"Now you're being foolish again," he said in a kind voice. "Tomorrow's lecture by Sollievo will probably make everyone forget about both of us. That's the way it works."

She grimaced, scrubbing her hand through her hair again. "So it is," she said with a sigh. "I'm sorry. I _am_ very glad you came. Were you standing back there the whole time?"

"Yes. I was of a mind to wish you luck, but was… delayed. I didn't want to make an entrance and disrupt your lecture, so I crept in the back way."

Mentally pushing all of the unpleasantness aside, she asked the question that had been foremost in her mind since that owl had landed on her window sill and shattered her foolish day dreams. "How _are_ you?"

His lips compressed into something that was caught between a scowl and a smile. "I'm very well, thank you."

"Good. That's good to hear. May I ask where you're working now? Or is that—am I being intrusive?" Belatedly realizing how destructive their sniping at each other could have been she suddenly panicked. "I hope I haven't—I didn't mean to—oh, gods. I shouldn't have snapped at you at all. I'm so sorry! I should have been more mindful of your… boundaries. No doubt even talking together probably isn't good for you at all…"

"No! Not at all." He grimaced and stepped forward, lifting an arm and then dropping it back to his side. "I'm… _better_. Is that even the right word?"

"Stronger?" she supplied, remembering her own journey.

"Resilient," he countered.

"Oh, that's a good one!"

He gave her a small smile, gesturing toward the exit. "Perhaps you would let me escort you to the cocktail hour as a demonstration, so to speak."

She blinked and smiled. "I'd like that very much." With a nod, she let him lead her off the small stage.

"As to your question, I have been working in Bulgaria."

She jerked to a stop. "You moved to _Bulgaria?_ So far?"

Her face must have reflected the terrible thoughts this brought to mind, because he stopped, shaking his head slowly. "It wasn't you, Hermione. It was _me_. And it was a good move. I made a lot of changes in my life and all of them for the better. I work exclusively in research now but still travel to London quite frequently."

She smiled, hoping it conveyed her support and understanding. "Are you still seeing Yolanda?"

He smirked. "Less often. I check in with her once a month now. Just to make sure I'm on track."

She snorted, remembering her own reluctance to end her therapy. "It's a bit like trying to kick a habit, isn't it?" Her flippant words belatedly made her cringe. "I mean—that is—"

"It's an apt observation," he said with a snort.

She sagged with relief. "I'm sorry I'm so awkward. I… I feel like I'm sprinting through a minefield but you're the one that will get hurt."

"Don't—" He sighed and shook his head. "I wish… you wouldn't feel like that."

She shrugged. "I'll do my best. That's all I can promise. Come on, i'll buy you a drink."

Looking self-conscious but determined, he said, "I don't drink."

She let that potential conversation fly past and gestured toward the door. "Tea, then."

"Coffee would be welcome," he replied, leading the way off the small stage.

They fell into an intensely uncomfortable silence as they made their way to the end-of-day cocktail party in one of the smaller banquet rooms of the hotel. The mirrors and paintings on the walls were an easy distraction from the fact that she couldn't think of a single thing to say. On the outside, the building looked like a derelict warehouse leftover from the communist era. However, inside it was opulent. The Wizarding community in Romania was enthusiastic about indulging guests and loved to throw a party, so a party was thrown every night. The cocktail hour at the end of each day's lectures was only the beginning of an entire night's festivities.

As soon as they entered the room, there was an excited flurry of movement, and Hermione cast a panicked look at Snape as they were surrounded. She was physically pulled away from him by the elbow, and turned to see Henri Lumet, one of her intellectual idols, smiling broadly at her. "I 'ave so very many more questions for you, Madam. Please, a moment of your time?"

A glass of cordial was placed in her hand, it smelled of cherries, and she barely managed a last look over her shoulder before she was whisked away to a relatively quiet part of the room. All that could be seen of Snape was the back of his head as the crowd closed around him

:

Hungry, frazzled and more than a bit tired, Hermione finally made her way into the main banquet room and nearly ran for the buffet table. She loaded her plate with one of everything and then turned to find a place to sit. She spotted Snape right away, easy to pick out in all that black. He was sitting stiffly, refilling a glass with mineral water, while two women chattered away at him on either side.

Bert caught her eye with his mad gesticulating, and she smiled and headed across the room, toward the empty seat next to him.

"There you are! Must be nice, eh? The hottest up-and-comer in the industry? I saw Lumet home in on you, and Sollievo was practically dancing from foot to foot to get your attention! Congratulations, Hermione. You made it."

She snorted. "So it would seem, but what have I made?"

Trudy laughed and leaned across Bert's plate to say, "Waves, my dear. You made waves."

"Yes, but they all want to know what I am working on next as if they expect me to pull a rabbit out of my ear. It's a little disturbing, to say the least."

"Don't worry about that now," Bert said with a smile. "You should be proud. You have raised the bar, not just for yourself, but for all of St. Mungo's as well."

She shook her head. "Yes, well, excuse me while I concentrate on raising my fork."

She hunched over and began shoveling food in.

An hour later, she was kicked back in her chair patting her full belly and sipping on another glass of _vişinată_. The thick cordial was made from sour cherries and plum brandy and it was insanely good. After she'd declined a dance, Bert had swept Trudy out onto the floor, and Hermione laughed, watching her colleagues mangle a rumba. She tilted her head to the side, watching Snape in an animated discussion with DiFranco from Torino. She smiled. Her mentor seemed confident when he spoke, not quite relaxed, but she couldn't detect any anxiety lurking in his expression. She smirked at his reaction when DiFranco said something Snape obviously didn't agree with. The way he pulled his head back and flared his nostrils was an old, familiar expression of thinly veiled contempt. DiFranco began gesticulating wildly and Snape turned his head away with a sigh. When he saw her, he rolled his eyes ,and she lifted her hand to her mouth to smother a giggle. He smirked and returned to his conversation.

A glass of wine was placed before her as the chair next to her was pulled out. She turned, still smiling, to offer thanks, but froze as Daniël Asquith, her former research partner, dropped into the seat beside her.

"So," he slurred, lifting the glass of wine he still held. "Shall we toast?"

She kept her hands folded in her lap and just eyed the man.

"No? You won't join me? Then I shall toast alone." Lifting his glass higher, he shouted. "To intellectual property and those that steal it!"

Hermione pulled his arm down. "You're making a fool of yourself, Daniël. I didn't steal anything, and you know it. If you hadn't been sandbagging the whole time we worked together, we could have presented that paper together _last_ _year_."

"That was my work!" he snapped.

"No, it wasn't! It was mine, based on my expansion of your original findings, and I gave you every credit _where_ it was _due_ _!_ I owed you nothing more. If you hadn't been so busy resting on your skinny laurels, you would have seen where you could have taken your findings further!"

He scowled at her, his face turning a mottled red, and leaned in to hiss in her face. "They all think I'm a has-been now because of _you!_ "

Hermione tsked in disgust and stood up. "This conversation is over."

As she was turning away, she caught Asquith's quick movement from the corner of her eye. She spun around as he snatched his wand out of his sleeve. All conscious thought stopped. One moment, he was intoning a curse, the next, he was being blown backward, chair and all. The red streak of his curse flew wide of the silvery-blue glow that covered her from head to toe.

It took several heartbeats before her mind processed it all.

 _She'd_ done it.

Presented with a threat, she'd reacted on instinct. Her wand had been drawn and her silent _Reducto_ sent flying while the man's curse had still been just a red glow on the tip of his wand. And yet… someone _else_ had reacted just as quickly.

She blinked at her wand, seeing her fingers encased in an unfamiliar Protective Charm so strong she could actually feel it. It was as if she'd been wrapped in a sizzling satin. She saw the thick rope of spell-tendril leading away from her shoulder and followed it with her eyes across the room to where it originated. Snape was still aiming his continuous spell at her, but his face was a twisted mask of murderous rage as he stared at Asquith crumpled against the wall. Even as she watched, the spell grew stronger, the blue overtaking the silver, the feeling of silk growing thicker against her skin.

The stunned silence in the room came to an abrupt end as Robyn Praet, Asquith's research assistant, came bustling over. "I'm so sorry, Mrs. Jordan! I was afraid something like this was going to happen. He's been so angry, and I knew he'd been drinking too much. I only let him out of my sight for just a moment. Are you alright?"

People all started shouting at once, some calling for the Aurors, while others jostled for proximity to her so they could cast Diagnostic Charms. None of them worked with Snape's shield encasing her. Trudy bustled up, wrapping an arm around Hermione's shoulder and giving a yelp at the static-charged pop she received. "I think she's safe now, Mr. Snape," she said in an unsteady voice. Bert was suddenly there between Hermione and Asquith, spinning in circles as he tried to keep his eyes on the unconscious researcher while checking to see that Hermione was all right at the same time.

"Are you hurt at all, my dear?" Bert said in the middle of another pirouette. "Of course you're aren't. You handled yourself marvelously. I must say I always had trouble reconciling the brilliant young researcher I know with the stories of daring do from your youth, but plainly, you have always been more than meets the eye." He gestured across the room. "And so is our Mr. Snape."

"I'm fine," she replied. Snape was still staring at Asquith, plainly struggling with his fury. The two women who had been his dinner companions were saying something to him in stridently soothing tones that appeared to have no effect.

"Severus?" Hermione called. She called him twice more before he finally turned his head and met her eyes. His rage changed to an expression of concern and then morphed into something far more stark that felt like it knifed through her soul. He canceled his Protective Charm with a flick. The two women danced out of his way as he took several steps toward her, but he was still more than ten feet away when he stopped. His face turned an alarming shade of pale before he spun on his heel and headed for the door.

Hermione started after him, hampered by the many concerned and caring people around her. She tried to be reassuring and polite, but as the last black scrap of Snape's robes flicked out of sight around the doorway, she began batting at them. "Excuse me, yes, I'm fine, I'm sorry, I need to— _Please!_ " she finally cried. "I must speak to Severus!" With a last, helpless gesture begging for forgiveness, she turned and ran in the direction her mentor had gone.

She gained the hallway and spun in a circle, looking for him. One of the many gilded mirrors on the wall showed a hint of black down the corridor disappearing through the door to the stairs leading up toward the guest rooms. She darted after it, lifting the hem of her business robes and tossing decorum to the floor. She threw open the door and cried, "Severus, wait!" When there was no response, she raced up the stairs. The carpeting on the stairs muffled sound, but the soft thumps she heard ahead of her, always around the next turn, never grew closer. Taking them two at a time didn't seem to gain her any advantage. By the time she reached the landing leading to the seventh floor, she had a stitch in her side and was gasping for air. She clung to the rail, panting. Somewhere ahead of her, she heard a door bang open and snick shut. Sucking in a lungful of air, she pushed off and stumbled up the last flight. Throwing her weight against the fire door, she shoved it open and tumbled out into the open air. Before her— _right_ before her—was a majestic view of Budapest in all its glory. Vertigo made the city swim as she threw herself back and slammed up against the closed door behind her.

"You're useless! Utterly and completely useless!" Snape's snarl came from somewhere beyond the corner of wall by her left shoulder. "Come on, _come on!_ "

Caught between her terror of heights and the necessity to make sure he was alright, she sidled along the short wall, prying her eyes off the terrifying view long enough to peek around the edge.

Severus was standing in the center of the flat roof, throttling a cranberry-red mobile phone. He shoved it up in the air only to pull it back and whack it against his hand several times. "Why is there no bloody signal? I'm _outside_ , for fuck's sake!"

"Severus?" she called, belatedly aware that perhaps she shouldn't have been running after him if he was in such a state. "Are you alright?"

He spun around and gurgled a half hysterical laugh. "Do I fucking look alright?"

She shook her head. "No. You don't look alright at all." She slid around the corner, keeping her back pressed against the cinder-block wall, fighting the panic caused by the view. She kept her eyes on the rooftop, inching her way sideways as she said, "Please let me help."

" _Help?_ Your the bloody _problem!_ "

The anguish in his voice dissolved her fear of heights, replacing it with devastation. Her voice sounded thin and quavery as she cried, "But you said it _wasn't_ me! Just earlier, you told me you were strong now!"

"But that was before!" He took two steps closer and stopped, seeming to shrink in on himself as he struggled with his robes, trying to find a pocket to shove his phone into. "I'd made peace with myself. I _thought_ I had. I don't know." He gave up, his arms flailing wide, the mobile still clutched in his hand. "I _had_. But then—" He jabbed the phone in the vague direction of the banquet several floors below. "Hermione, the only reason why I came here was to see _you_. I cobbled together that _insipid_ paper so I could attract your notice. Don't you see? You're my last demon to slay. I've come to an understanding with myself about my past and my parents and my faults—and even bloody _Lily Evans_. It was my hope that I was finally strong enough to do the same with you." He stared down at his hand as if wondering why he was still holding the phone and then carefully shoved it in his breast pocket. He sighed and stared down at his feet. "I don't give a damn about the conference or the opinions of any of these wankers. I wanted to see _you_. I thought, perhaps, I could just… get to know you. Learn to just be this _friend_ that you wanted."

She pushed off the wall and hurried closer. "Severus, wait. Listen—"

He backed away, flailing his arm to keep her at a distance. "Let me speak!" Scrubbing his face with his hands, he continued. "But I can't be friends, can I?" He dropped his hands and looked at her, his expression an open wound. "I can't get over you." Staring up at the sky, he curled his hands into fists. "What I've done, how I feel... I thought I could function around it now. I've had so many years of practice loving a woman from afar. I thought… I was _content_ with my lot, fully accepting that what I want cannot be, but now I've been forced to face facts! It's all stuff and nonsense! That bastard tried to hurt you! Don't you understand what happened tonight? He could have killed you! I almost _lost_ you! My carefully constructed contentment depends on you being _alive_. If something were to happen to you… How can I ever be sure you're safe? You see? It's madness! _I_ _can't_ _keep you safe!_ "

"You don't have to!" She stood up straight, balling her hand and thumping it against her chest. "Do _you_ understand what happened tonight? I saved _myself!_ That was my worst nightmare come true—a man popping up out of the blue to to curse me again—and _I saved_ _myself!"_ She spread her hands, gesturing to the world around them. "You can't keep me safe, Severus, but you don't have to. _I_ can."

A small, bittersweet smile crept across his features as he tilted his head to the side. "And so you did," he said in a quiet voice. "You didn't need me at all. You were marvelous. But then, you always were. Marvelous and strong and dazzlingly bright." He shrugged. "I've been deluding myself into thinking I was anywhere near your league. What a fool I've made of myself."

"No, don't say such things. Severus—"

"It's true," he said. "I came here to learn to be a friend and instead I've shown you, yet again, how pathetic I am. Not that my last correspondence didn't spell it out clearly enough. I can only imagine it was unpleasant to find out how… _attached_ I'd become to you, when all you'd been interested in was friendship."

She swallowed around the lump in her throat and blurted, "You have crap hair."

He froze, looking deeply affronted. " _What?_ "

"You're hair. It's really horrid. And your nose is just… tragic."

His eyes flew wide as one of his hands covered the center of his face. "What the hell are you on about?" he snapped.

"I have something important to tell you and I thought you might want some reassurances that I'm not cursed first. I also think your teeth are horrible. My parents were dentists, you know, and teeth are something I pay particular attention to. Yours are—"

His eyebrows snapped down. "Yes, I get the gist now. Let's not flog the point before we get to it."

She walked across the rooftop until there was only two paces left between them. "Severus, if your peace of mind depends on staying a thousand miles away from me, then a thousand miles away I will stay. The last thing I would ever want is to cause you more pain and suffering. I will abide by whatever your wishes are. But I want you to have all the facts before you decide. I don't want to be your friend." She threw a hand up as the blood drained from his face, and shook her head. "It wouldn't be enough for me. I want more." Black eyes went round and his lips parted ever so slightly as she continued. "I've fallen in love with you so many times and in so many ways I've lost count. It seems with you I've felt nearly every texture and every flavor of attraction possible. Despite everything I'd been through and how terrible that night was for both of us, there were certain things I couldn't push out of my mind. Your smile. Your tenderness. The vulnerability you let me see. I finally saw the wonderful person you'd been hiding from the world, and as much as I needed to move beyond that night, I couldn't really let that man go. The ghost of what was possible with you ruined my marriage. Every day I was forced to admit that Lee paled in comparison to those few glimpses I was given of who you really were. I was _crushed_ when you told me those glimpses were nothing more than a drug-induced fraud. When you started popping up at my door, it didn't take long for _me_ to be the one struggling with the depth of my regard. I had no reason to believe you would even remotely welcome my attentions in that way. Why would you after what had happened between us? When you didn't show up that night, I was furious with myself. I thought I had somehow pushed you away, or disgusted you by wanting more than a pleasant acquaintance. And then you sent me that letter..."

She shrugged, swiping at the tears forming in her eyes. "You're not the only one who had an ulterior motive in coming to Budapest. I was running out of ways to back out of this damned conference until I saw you were on the program, and then it was as if nothing could keep me away. You say you came here to just be my friend? We'll, I don't want that. I want _more_." She took a deep breath and blew it out. "Now, as I said, if your recovery depends on keeping clear boundaries between us, then I completely understand. I will wish you love and luck in all your endeavors, and we'll each go our own way." She lifted her chin and bunched her hands into fists to keep them from shaking. "However, if you want—if you feel we have even a small chance—"

A broken gurgle of a cry escaped him and he clapped both hands to his mouth to stifle it. "Oh, Hermione…" he said softly. "Please don't say these things if you don't mean it. It would be a cruelty even I don't deserve..."

She swallowed thickly and tilted her chin up further. "I'm telling you the truth. I love you, Severus Snape."

The wind tossed his lank hair into his face. When the changing gust blew it out of the way again, she saw tears streaming from his eyes. Rather than the happiness she'd expected, he looked lost. "I don't know what to do next," he said.

She raised her arms. "Maybe we could start with a hug?"

He shook his head and stepped back. "Hermione, this is just... Stockholm Syndrome. You _can't_ feel this way after what I did to you."

"Oh, bullshit. I've had years to process my feelings for you and I know what I'm feeling is real. I fancy you, Severus. You're smart and caring and proud. You're _incredibly_ loyal, and you have an ungodly wit. Whenever I see you my heart skips a beat, my thoughts scatter like dried leaves, and I find I can't even breathe right. I _want_ you. I want to _be_ with you."

His sad expression deepened into one of profound sorrow. "I might hurt you again. I couldn't bear it."

"And I might _hurt you_. If we're to have a chance, then we have to risk getting hurt. _Terribly_ hurt. The past between us is full of broken glass, and I don't see how we can navigate a future without at least a few cuts. But I think, if we take it slowly and really communicate what we're feeling or thinking on a day-to-day basis, then we could make it work. I'm willing to try. It's all or nothing now. There's no pretending we don't know how we feel about each other." She sighed, seeing her words had little effect on his forlorn expression. "I don't want you to feel pressured. Take some time to think about it if you need to. I will respect and abide by your needs. I just wanted you to know all the facts before you committed yourself to a conclusion."

The silence stretched longer before he swiped angrily at his eyes and straightened up. "You do realize I'm never going to be particularly well-wrapped, don't you?"

"Were you ever?"

He paused, his expression turning inward, but then he shook his head and replied, "No."

"Don't you think you're far better wrapped these days than you were before?"

"Yes, but I'm hardly a good judge of my own sanity, am I?"

"What does Yolanda say?"

He took a deep breath and let it out. "She's repeatedly stated that I have made great strides and she is very proud of the work I've done on putting my past to rest. She knew my plans in coming here and agreed it was time you and I sat down and talked about the past. I doubt she had any idea that there would be talk of a future."

"So there _is_ going to be more talk about a future?"

He swallowed hard and whispered, "Do you _really_ love me?"

She closed the distance between them, stopping when the hem of her gown brushed his boots. "Yes. I do."

His eyes fluttered shut and he leaned down, touching his forehead to hers. "Hermione, I would… very much like to have a future with you."

She sighed, nearly collapsing from the relief. "Good," she said inanely. "Excellent." She reached over and took his hand, wrapping her fingers around it and giving it a little squeeze. "That's a grand start. There's no rush. We can let this understanding sit a bit and talk more later. Or even tomorrow, after a good night's rest. There's plenty of time to think things over, no rush. I don't want you to feel pressured."

He grimaced and tugged on her hand, drawing her closer. She could see the glint of wild emotions in his eyes. Lifting her other hand, she stroked it down the side of his face and felt him shudder under her touch. She sighed as he tenderly took her into his arms and dipped his head down. His lips met hers in the gentlest of caresses, once, twice, before he slanted them across hers and deepened it. The tiniest sob escaped her as he pulled her closer and tightened his arms around her.

Breaking the kiss, he pressed his cheek against her temple, crushing her against him. "Oh, Christ, Hermione. I've wanted to do that for such a long time."

She nodded, her hands fisted in his robes. "Me too," she whispered.

When she pulled back and looked up at him, she saw tears caught on his lashes. She raised her hands and swiped at them with her thumbs, and he snorted softly. "I'm afraid I do that rather easily these days," he said with obvious discomfort. "It's a byproduct of demon slaying."

"You don't have to explain. I think they're beautiful."

He gave a quiet, scornful laugh. "That would make them my best feature then."

Scowling she shook her head. "Don't do that. I happen to be very fond of all your features. As unconventional as they can seem at first, they grew on me a long time ago."

His eyes softened, and he smiled at her warmly, lifting a hand and stroking it through her hair. "This hardly seems real. Say it again."

"I love you."

He smiled then. A small, timid curve of his lips slowly blossomed into an open, honest, heart-on-his-sleeve smile as he wrapped his arms tighter around her and rested his chin on her forehead. "I've won," he said in a voice filled with wonder and marvel.

"We won," she replied.

He kissed her brow and pulled back. "I will make you so very happy, Hermione. I promise."

"I know you will."

"I'll do everything in my power to please you. You'll never hear a cross word from me. Ever."

"Yes, I will. Probably before the day is out."

He frowned. "No, you won't."

"Severus, even people that love each other get on each other's nerves on occasion."

"I'm different."

"Well, that goes without saying, but you cant start out making unrealistic promises."

He set his jaw, mulishly. "It's not unrealistic."

"It certainly is!"

He scrunched up his face. "Do you _want_ me to bark at you?"

"I want you to be _yourself_."

His snort was elegant, as was his eye-roll. "Oh, yes, because that's always worked out splendedly for me."

She leaned up on her toes and kissed his frown. He kissed her back, a slow, gentle kiss full of tender promise. "Let's just be us for now," she said when they broke apart. "because I rather like who you really are."

He smiled again, that smile that made her heart feel as if it wanted to burst with joy. "Alright," he said in a quiet voice. "I'll follow your lead. You've more experience in these things."

"Yes, well, my experience led to divorce. I fear we're a bit like the blind leading the lame."

"I thought it was the lame leading the blind."

She flicked her hand in the air. "Whichever it is, slow and steady is the way to go."

"Indeed," he said. "We should take our time. As you said, now that there is a possibility of an us, then rushing things would be counter productive, given the nature of our past."

"Exactly," she said, beaming at him. "No rush."

He stroked a finger along her cheek, his eyes glowing with a smile. "One day at a time."

"We have all the time in the world..."

:

Hermione's breath rushed out in a whoosh as her back hit the wall. His lips left her neck with a wet smack, and he darted a worried look at her face. "Alright?" he asked, panting.

She nodded and continued attacking the knots of his cravat. "Don't stop," she urged.

He returned to her neck, dragging his lips closer to the swell of her bosom. One hand left the curve of her hip to explore the luscious curve of her arse.

She started in on his robes only to stop. He reacted to her stillness at once, his hand flew off her rump as his head snapped up. He stared at her, worried. "Too much?"

" _No._ Not at _all_. I just figured out what was different about you." she said with a grin. "Severus, where did all your buttons go?"

His eyes crinkled up as he popped the four buttons on his robes with one hand and shrugged out of them. "I didn't need them anymore," he said.

She gave him a smiled filled with giddy wonder and said, "That's... that's so marvelous!"

His chest swelled with pride. Pride and triumph and love and joy and a sense of wonderment so incredible that it almost, _almost,_ kept him from checking her pupils.

Again.

"Kiss me," she said in a breathy voice that went straight to his groin. He did. Kissing Hermione was like feasting on magic's source itself and he never wanted to stop.

She started in on his waistcoat, only three buttons, when a knock on the door made them both freeze.

She cleared her throat. "Who's there?" she called.

"Hermione? It's Trudy. I came to see if you're alright."

"Shit." she muttered under her breath. "Give me a moment," she murmured. He nodded and reached down to snatch up his robes and stepped out of view of the door. She patted at her hair, a futile gesture of ever there was one, and opened it a crack."

"Are you alright?" the other woman asked. "Bert and I have been looking for you everywhere. Did you find Snape?"

"Yes, ah, yes I did. I'm fine. He's fine. We're all fine. Everything's fine. Thank you. Sorry to have worried you."

Snape rolled his eyes. The love of his life would have made a lousy spy.

"Darling," the other woman said with humor in her voice, "are you aware your lipstick is all over your face?"

Hermione swiped at her lips, while Snape, standing just off to the side, scrubbed at his mouth with the sleeve of his robes.

"Is it? Imagine that. Well, I've had a long day. I think I'll go to bed now."

"I bet you will," was the amused reply.

"Good night, Trudy. Thank you for checking up on me."

"Good night. Glad you're... alright."

The other woman's giggle could be heard long after Hermione closed her hotel room door with a firm thump.

She turned around, her lip caught firmly in her teeth. The fiery glow of passion had dimmed in her eyes, replaced with worry. The effect was akin to a good dousing with ice water.

He sighed and snapped out his robes to put them back on. "We jumped the gun, didn't we?"

"A bit, yes," she said.

"My apologies. I... lost control."

Tracing her lips with her finger tips she said, "So did I."

"This is all so," he waved a hand, encompassing her, himself, the large bed, and his new world in general, "surreal."

She smiled, nodding. "I've never had a dream come true before," she said.

"What about winning the war?"

She frowned. "That was a nightmare ending. Not the same at all."

"True." He re-buttoned his waistcoat before fixing his cuffs. Slanting a look up at her through his hair, he couldn't help but ask, "Does that mean you've dreamt of me?"

She stepped forward, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head on his shoulder. "Yeah," she said. "I did. A lot."

He hugged her close. "As did I." He flicked a hand at the bed. "This..." He sighed. "This part of it is bound to be problematic. We were foolish to have rushed."

She shrugged. "True, but the rushing was very thrilling."

He chuckled.

"And I have to admit," she said, lifting her head to give him a secretive little smile, "I spent a good deal of time dreaming about that part of it."

He breath rushed out of him, leaving him dizzy. " _Did_ you...?"

She caught her lip in her teeth and nodded. "To be completely honest, and honesty is the best way to go here, despite how wretched that night was, you were still the best lover I've ever had."

A strangled squeak escaped his chest. "Hermione..."

"I know," she said, flapping a hand and taking a step back. "It's not rational, but there it is."

He snorted, pulling her close again. "You, me, and rational don't seem capable of fitting under the same roof."

She giggled but her expression grew serious again. "Do you think there's a chance of us escaping that night?"

"I'd like to think we already have."

She smiled at him, nodding. "Good. Because there were certain aspects of it I would very much like to... analyze."

For several heartbeats, he forgot how to breathe. "Certainly, um, ah, anything in particular?"

She blushed crimson but nodded. "That first part, you know, when you...ah..."

All the blood in his body seemed to rush to his crotch, leaving him lightheaded. "Yes, I know which part you mean."

"What about you?" she asked. "Was there a part you liked best before, you know, it all turned into a lie?"

He swallowed with difficulty and cleared his throat. "The wall."

"The wall?"

"When you ran me into the wall. I actually rather liked that. And just about every millisecond that came after." He grimaced. "Until it all turned into a lie..."

She gave him a look that left his blood burning in his veins and nudged him until he bumped up against the wall behind him.

"We're going to rush things again, aren't we?" he said. "Please tell me we're going to rush things again."

She nodded and leaned up on her toes to kiss him. "I'm afraid we are..."

:

"There! Right there! Gods, yes, just like that! Oh!"

Severus was nearly demented with his need to come, the effort to stave off his own release made his molars grind and his eyes cross, but he tilted his hips the way she needed and continued pounding away until, with a delicious quivering and a decadent, husky wail, she finally broke apart beneath him. As she arched her back and shuddered against him, he began to babble, "Beautiful, so fucking beautiful. Christ, I love when you cry out for me like that. My beauty, my love... fuck, gods, _yesssss_..." His climax, too long denied, slipped from his control, and he groaned, long and loud as he filled her. "Hermione," he whispered as he crushed her to the bed.

He tried to roll off her but she clasped her arms around his sweat-soaked back and held him in place as he tried to calm his pounding heart. He rolled anyway, dragging her with him and kissing her between panting breaths. "I love you," he gasped out.

"I know," she said with a contented sigh as she settled her body along his. When their breathing evened out, she shoved up on an elbow and reached across him to grab the bottle of mineral water, stopping to kiss his chest on the way. She took a long drink, and he watched in spent arousal as a trickle of water escaped and ran down her chin to mix with the sweat on her neck. He wanted to lick it away but was too sated to move. She offered him the bottle, and, as he drank, flicked her hair to the side and pointed to the clock. "We missed Lumet's presentation."

"He's a wanker anyway," he said with a smirk, setting the bottle back on the bedside table.

She rolled her eyes. "So you've always said, but he does give a good presentation."

He reached up and pulled her back down, reveling in the way she sprawled bonelessly against his chest with a contented sigh. "You said the same about Sollievo last night but didn't seem inclined to leave the bed when I prodded you this morning."

She raised her head and gave him a deliciously wicked grin. "I had my priorities straight. Speaking of which, you had said you'd promised DiFranco that you'd attend his lecture. That starts in twenty minutes."

Running his hand along the curve of her arse and up her spine, he urged her closer for a kiss. When they finally broke apart, he drawled, "To hell with DiFranco. To hell with all of them. I also have my priorities in order and you give a much, _much_ better presentation."

She giggled and dragged the sheet up over their cooling bodies with a happy sigh. "I don't remember ever being this happy before," she said.

Her words, her beautiful, beautiful words, stung tears from his eyes, and he gathered her up into his arms and replied, "I've waited a lifetime to feel this way."

She cradled his face in her slender hands, and looked deep into his eyes for a long moment before leaning down and giving him a long, languid kiss. He wondered how long it would be before he stopped noting the size of her pupils before he kissed her back.

* * *

"Come on then! Let's get a move on," Bert hollered.

Hermione dragged her suitcase behind her as she made her way through the lobby to where Bert, Trudy and the four research assistants were all waiting just outside. He held up an old, plastic petrol canister that had been turned into a Portkey. She looked around, stomach in knots, and when she saw Severus leaning against the wall, she nearly sagged to the floor.

"Just a moment!" she called to them, leaving her suitcase behind and rushing over to him. "You waited," she said, throwing her arms around him. "Gods, I thought I'd missed you…" She sank into his embrace , tossing their decision to keep a lid on things to the winds.

"I would never leave you without a farewell again."

She sighed, breathing in his scent. "I don't like this," she whispered. "I'm afraid if I let go, something terrible will happen and I'll lose you again. We've only had the two days. It's not fair. Bulgaria is so far away."

He lifted her chin with a gentle finger. "I'll be in London next week," he said softly. "And you have my address and my number."

"I should never have got rid of my mobile," she hissed for the tenth time. "I'll get another as soon as I'm home."

"Then we will be able to talk that much sooner."

She smiled, knowing it wobbled crookedly on her face. "You promise?"

He smiled at her, and then his dark eyes scanned the lobby quickly before he kissed her. It was short and intense and full of promises. "Go," he said quietly.

"Right," she said with a sigh. She leaned up and kissed him one more time before darting back to her suitcase. With a last, longing look, she darted out the doors to where her colleagues were muttering, chortling, and only just beginning to take the piss.

:

Severus watched her whirl out of sight and then gently pressed his fingertips to the tender pain in his chest her departure caused. Two days, technically thirty-nine hours, since she'd told him she cared for him and wanted a future together. He felt the stirrings of old madnesses—the desire to go after her, to keep an eye on her, the fear of something dark ruining everything—but he pushed them all away, knowing them for what they were, ghosts of the past.

He had gambled everything he'd gained on the chance of just a friendship, and walked off with a bigger prize than he'd thought possible. That was worth holding on to every scrap of hard-earned sanity. He couldn't squander this gift life had given him with foolish insecurities. Instead, he would be the best person he was capable of being so he could spend the rest of his life making her happy.

He picked up his valise and headed out the door himself, stopping to pull out his phone. He sent a quick text message, and then Apparated away.

* * *

Yolanda Peeples was finishing her morning tea before heading off to the shower when her business mobile chimed with a message. Picking it up, she read the words 'I won it all,' and pressed her fingertips against her smile. Shaking her head, she set her phone down and went to start her day.

:

* * *

AN:


End file.
